


Saved

by Slanguage



Series: The Righteous Man [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Angels, Demons, Destiel - Freeform, Hell, M/M, Righteous Man, Torture, castiel novak - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-09
Updated: 2014-11-22
Packaged: 2018-01-11 19:01:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 28
Words: 109,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1176719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Slanguage/pseuds/Slanguage
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The only thing Castiel Novak ever knew was how to hunt monsters—ghosts and werewolves and demons and everything that goes bump in the night. With the help of the man he secretly loves, Dean Winchester, and Dean’s little brother, Sam, the three of them had been a force to be reckoned with. But, in a last-ditch effort to save Sam’s life, Castiel sold his soul to Hell, and the hellhounds dragged him down to the Rack when his year was up. Now Castiel is being tortured—physically by the fiendish Alastair, and mentally by the memories of what he had.</p><p>Until one day a young woman with red hair appeared in the middle of Hell, and she asked him if he wanted to be saved. And, without realizing the consequences, Castiel said yes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Skin and Bone

 

 

He would never forget the look on Dean’s face when Dean saw what he had done.

He would never forget the look on Dean’s face when his hands were covered in blood, and Dean was screaming, and Dean was crying as he died in his arms.

He would never forget the look on Dean’s face when they first met, or when Dean asked him to join him and his brother on their country-wide hunt for the Yellow-Eyed Demon. He would never forget the look on Dean’s face when he cradled his baby brother’s body, and he would never forget the look on Dean’s face when midnight came, and the hellhounds arrived.

Castiel couldn’t help but to wonder if maybe that was the point of Hell.

Hell never let you forget.

*

Alastair came to him at the same time every single day. Castiel had never hated someone as much as he hated that demon, the one in charge of all the tortured souls on what he liked to call the Rack. Castiel had no idea how long it had been since he first gotten here—time didn’t pass down here the same as it did in the regular world, he knew that much from his stay so far. It felt like decades and centuries of being continuously tortured, his bones broken and his skin split, holding on until he couldn’t anymore, and then he was suddenly okay and put together again and he only got a few minutes to himself before it all began again.

It always began with Alastair.

“Castiel,” Alastair slurred, his smile greasy, and just his presence made Castiel’s skin crawl. “Well, it’s good to see you again, son. Have you thought anymore about my offer?”

After every day of torture, Alastair asked him the same question. Castiel could barely get his breath back, the pain still a constant dull ache in his bones, when Alastair would turn back to look at him and say, “This can all end if you take my place, Castiel. You won’t have to face this torture anymore if you became my apprentice. Think about it.”

He would only be free from the torture if he became the torturer. It would end for him, but what would be the true cost?

Every time, Castiel told Alastair the same answer: _No_. And then the torture began again, but Castiel at least knew that he had his pride of sticking to his values.

That pride was nearly diminished. Castiel lived his life protecting people, saving them, but he didn’t know how much longer he could continue to be selfless before he broke completely. Castiel knew that he wouldn’t be able to last for much longer and, by the growing smirk on Alastair’s face, growing smugger with every passing day, Alastair knew it as well.

But Castiel was still strong enough. Today, he would not break.

He told Alastair the same answer he always did: “No.”

Alastair signaled for his apprentice, who picked up a knife and began again.

*

When Castiel had those few moments to recover himself, those moments of peace, he spent it thinking about Dean Winchester.

Castiel had been alone through his life ever since his family had been killed in front of him by a wendigo and he had somehow managed to escape at the age of four, only to be passed around through orphanages until he was sixteen and he just couldn’t take it anymore, and that is when he bought a cheap car and began hunting the monsters he knew existed. He made few friends in the hunting business, but he met the Harvelles and was immediately adopted into their family, and that was how he became acquainted with the main players in the American hunting arena. It was there, on a break between hunts, when two young men walked in after hours, and they both ended up changing the course of his life.

That had been the night Castiel met Dean Winchester, and that changed everything.

The Winchester brothers had been led there by Bobby Singer—he had found a voicemail on one of John Winchester’s old phones regarding a demon he had been looking for, so the brothers had come to investigate. Their father had been dead for months by then—killed by the demon he had spent the brothers’ entire lives hunting for, the demon that had killed his wife—and Dean and Sam were picking up on the hunt, finding it to be a conflict of interest that they otherwise would not discuss. They got to talking due to a shared connection of familial revenge and him and Dean sharing the same age, and being around the two of them had been easier than he had expected from years of suffering from social anxiety. And he hadn’t been able to look away from Dean’s unreal green eyes the entire time.

Before they left, they had exchanged numbers, saying to call if they needed any help on a hunt or anything, and they went their separate ways.

It was the first time that Castiel ever really had to question his sexuality.

It was something he never really had felt like he had to consider before—it had been a lifetime of nothing significant when it came to that front. Any relationship, when a hunter, is temporary, even when all parties involved didn’t want it to be, because that lifestyle was a constant weight on their shoulders. There was always somewhere they needed to be, someone who needed saving. There was nothing lasting to consider when they felt they had that responsibility.

Castiel had been attracted to many people. But even back then every day away from Dean was filled with his heart painfully constricting, and he felt like he was dying, and he barely knew him then. He had missed Dean when they were barely even friends.

They met up again on accident, following the same hunt about a month after their first meeting, and Dean asked him afterward if he wanted to join them on the next, and that is how it began.

Time for hunters always moved differently.

It went faster. There was everything to lose. Everything meant more because there wasn’t much else left. They knew they didn’t have much time left so they did whatever they wanted to do. There was no time to think long and hard about anything.

It didn’t take long for Castiel to fall in love with Dean Winchester.

*

This time was different.

Castiel’s whole body was still screaming from pain from the torturous day before when Alastair returned. Castiel’s hands were shaking as he could barely breathe through the heaving gasps rolling through his chest uncontrollably, and he couldn’t move any of his body. It hurt too much. Castiel couldn’t even writhe as Alastair approached him, amusement shining in his eyes as he watched Castiel suffer, his hands in his pockets like this was a casual affair. Castiel could barely keep his eyes open to keep his gaze on him.

“Hmm,” Alastair murmured. “That hurt more than the other times, huh?”

Castiel both couldn’t and wouldn’t answer. He tried to breathe, but it felt like he was breathing underwater. Liquid was filling in his lungs and he was drowning.

“You aren’t healing back up,” Alastair pointed out with fake pity. “This is how it will be from now on, Castiel. You have refused my offer too many times now. This pain will be all you know and worse from here on out.”

Castiel squeezed his eyes shut, but he was still choking on his own blood. He tried to cough and felt the blood on his tongue, on his chin, but he continued to drown, and Alastair continued to watch. The demon leaned closer to Castiel, his eyes laughing at him.

“This will stop,” he whispered, “if you just say yes.”

And Castiel broke. He couldn’t do it anymore.

He had lasted years, decades, but he couldn’t take the pain every day anymore. He was strong, but he wasn’t nearly strong enough to handle this hell.

He choked out through the blood, “Yes.”

Alastair tilted his head to the side with a sinister grin. He snapped his fingers and the pain was suddenly gone, and Castiel could breathe. He gasped in air greedily, desperately, while Alastair watched him the way a predator watches their prey. Castiel couldn’t move, his limbs too weak, so he stayed on his back with his eyes staring up, like maybe if he could distance himself enough then his weakness didn’t even exist.

“What was that, Castiel?” Alastair asked too innocently, his eyes on Castiel’s face. “I couldn’t hear you very well.”

Castiel managed to somehow, very clearly, reply, “Yes. Yes, I accept your offer.”

He didn’t have to watch his actions to see how weak he was, and a small part of himself, smothered smaller by his self-preservation, hated himself.

Alastair threw his head back, and he laughed. “Good, Castiel, _good_! Let’s get you started now before that conscience kicks in, hmm?”

“It won’t,” Castiel assured the demon, and he knew that he wouldn’t let himself have a conscience. Hell was forever—there was no escape. Only survival.

“Wonderful,” Alastair purred with a predatory smile, and Castiel knew that this would be the only world he would know from then on out. “Let us begin, then.”

Alastair handed Castiel a carving knife. And, after a moment, Castiel sat up and took it.

*

It all began when the psychic twenty-somethings began disappearing, and Sam followed soon behind.

Castiel had been a common Winchester accessory for about six months by then, and he had been enamored by Dean for about as long, secret and unrequited, but it hurt less when he was with them, so Castiel stayed. They had been following this suspicious trail of kids, now grown, who shared the common denominator of psychic, supernatural abilities—the same of which Sam exhibited. They were closing in on Azazel when Sam disappeared from the inside of a diner while Dean and Castiel had been standing outside, and all of the people inside of the diner, the loose ends, were killed before the two hunters outside noticed anything odd. And, by then, Sam was long gone.

Dean was terrified, and frantic, and Castiel felt every second of that—he as well cared strongly for Sam and wanted him to be okay, and seeing Dean in a state like that, so unlike his normal behavior, was crippling. After sleepless hours of phone calls and torturing demons for information, Dean had a strange mental picture of a bell and Sam, and Bobby knew where that bell was. The three of them set out, knowing nothing about what they were about to find or if they were going to find anything at all.

The most important thing Castiel learned from the Winchesters was blind faith.

They walked into the small ghost town not knowing what to expect. And they never would have expected what happened next.

The second they spotted the bell, the second they turned the bend, they saw Sam up ahead, clutching his shoulder and stumbling away from a body on the ground. Dean yelled his brother’s name and Sam saw them, a relieved smile breaking over his face as he began to move toward them, calling back his brother’s name with so much relief, suddenly and sharply reminding Castiel of a child lost in a grocery store finding his parent, the relief of someone being reunited with something they could have lost, and that made the next part even worse.

They saw it. Sam never had a chance.

The body of a man on the ground suddenly bolted onto his feet, grabbing a fallen knife from the ground, and Castiel didn’t remember if anyone had even managed to scream a warning before the man dug that knife into Sam’s back.

Castiel could still hear Dean’s screams as Sam fell to his knees, already so far gone, and the man who had stabbed him was running away. Dean made it to Sam first, throwing his weapons aside and sliding onto his knees to catch his brother. Castiel and Bobby had kept running—Castiel had wanted nothing more in that moment than to kill the man where he stood, all for Dean, always for Dean.

Castiel was faster than Bobby. He caught up to the man, and he managed to tackle him to the ground, and Castiel would have killed him if the man—Jake—had had any power other than added strength.

Castiel remembered landing some vicious blows, and he remembered having Jake’s blood on his hands. He doesn’t remember Jake’s punch, but he knew from Bobby’s retelling that it knocked him out and sent him flying several feet. Bobby hadn’t been able to get a shot in before Jake had disappeared into the surrounding woods, and they hadn’t been able to catch them.

They had found Dean cradling and rocking his little brother’s dead body, tears rolling down his face. Dean hadn’t even made a move to acknowledge their presence until several minutes later, when Castiel put his hand on his shoulder and murmured that they couldn’t stay there, that they should move him.

Losing Sam had been a more staggering loss than they ever would have imagined.

*

“I’m proud of you, for making this decision,” Alastair told him, pausing just outside of the plastic curtain enclosure like the one Castiel had been in until just moments ago. The demon nodded toward the knife Castiel held. “You know what to do. Only, there will be no offer—just tear them apart.”

Castiel looked at the opaque barrier, a heavy feeling in his stomach. He nodded, gripping the knife tightly.

“This may very well be the last you see of me,” Alastair let him know simply, patting him on the shoulder like a proud father. “Happy carving, Castiel.”

Alastair disappeared. Castiel waded through the dregs of his morality as he moved forward, moving away the plastic curtain and stepping under the light, looking without emotion toward the body lying on the table. A woman whimpered, attempting to get away. She flinched when she saw Castiel and the blade.

“Please,” she whimpered. She had to have been only a little bit older than Castiel. He came up to stand next to her, looking down at her.

“Hell has no time for mercy,” he told her a hard truth he had to learn the hard way, and he watched her skin split, and her screams shattered the quiet. He looked at her blood, and he let out the breath he had been holding.

And he made his next cut.

*

When Sam had been dead two days, Bobby told Dean that they had to bury him.

Dean had spent every moment since arriving at the abandoned house silently sitting next to the cot they had laid Sam’s body down on, not eating or sleeping, just sitting there silently with the empty shell of the person that had always meant the most to him. Castiel felt sick to his stomach every time he saw the vacant expression on Dean’s face, wondering if he would ever be okay again.

When Bobby told Dean it was about time to let Sam go, Dean exploded. He fell apart. They watched Dean Winchester break.

He wouldn’t do it. He wouldn’t even talk about burying him. When Bobby stepped forward to attempt to rationalize with him, Dean physically pushed him away, telling him to leave. And he did, once Castiel whispered that he would make sure everything was done and that he would make sure Dean was okay. Castiel could barely breathe through his grief—he could barely imagine how Dean had felt, with the pressure it was crushing even Castiel.

Castiel couldn’t take it anymore. He couldn’t take how hurt Dean was, and he couldn’t take the painfully obvious absence of Sam from the room.

Castiel loved Dean so much that he would do anything to save him from suffering like this.

He knew what he had to do.

He told Dean he would be right back, and he took the Impala to the nearest crossroads.

*

It didn’t take long before Castiel began to lose himself. To torturing, to the screaming, to playing God. He started to get the sickest thrill from it; he could finally control something in his life in a way he hadn’t been able to do anymore.

It felt better than pain.

He knew he would learn to hate himself. But, for now, there was only what Hell had taught him.

*

Castiel thought Dean was going to punch him when he finally made it back to that abandoned house, setting the keys to the Impala on a table by the door next to the Colt. Dean appeared in front of him and grabbed him by the collar, slamming him into the wall. Castiel winced, staring at Dean in surprise, barely even flustered by his face being so close.

“What did you do?” Dean demanded flatly under his breath, his eyes a swirl of undecipherable emotions. His grip tightened and his eyes flashed. “Cas, what the _fuck_ did you do?”

“I did what I had to do,” Castiel told him defiantly, his insides molten lava as he looked at Dean, the man he loved so much he hadn’t hesitated to sell his soul for his happiness.

And he had no idea how Castiel felt. Dean didn’t even _know_.

Dean shook him, his eyes desperate and scared, and demanded, “How long did she give you? Ten years? Five?”

“One,” Castiel barely managed to say.

Dean made a wounded sound, letting go of how he held Castiel to pass a hand over his face. He turned back, his hands fisting at his sides, his eyes strained as he said, “We’ll figure out how to get you out of this, Cas. We’ll think of something.”

“It’s okay, Dean,” Castiel murmured, smiling a little. “We all know that Sam is more important to us than I have ever been.”

Dean looked stunned, like Castiel had just sucker punched him, before his eyes darkened and he took a step forward, growling, “ _What did you just say_?”

Castiel didn’t get the chance to respond, as if he would have anyway. Sam popped out from around the corner, a cold piece of pizza in one hand, a liveliness in his eyes that made the world a little better again. The second Sam appeared, Dean dropped his dark expression and angry eyes and slapped on a casual expression—Sam didn’t notice.

“Hey, Cas,” Sam greeted, grinning. “Thanks for patching me up—Dean said it was a nasty one.”

“It was no problem at all, Sam,” Castiel replied easily, picking up on the lie Dean must have told so easily that it felt almost natural to play this game. “Feeling alright?”

“Good as new,” Sam said, spreading his arms. “Hungry as hell, though, and I was just about to tell Dean about what’s been going on, so you came back at just the right time.”

Castiel only managed to smile in response. It had been two days, but he had really missed the younger Winchester brother’s infallible spirit.

Sam suddenly stopped, his eyebrows pulling together. “You two alright?” he demanded, looking between them with the same face.

Castiel shrugged. “Why wouldn’t we be?”

Sam frowned a bit and traced the distance between the two of them one more time with his eyes before shrugging, turning back into the main room, speaking quick words Castiel’s muddled brain couldn’t understand in order to catch him up on the part of the story he must have already informed his brother about. Castiel met Dean’s eyes, knowing everything he was saying in them—that they were not done talking about this, and not to tell Sam what really happened—and he read it loud and clear.

Castiel sent Dean a long look before turning away and joining Sam at the dilapidated kitchen table piled high with cold food, knowing better than he had ever known anything that he had made the right decision.

*

In between torturing, Castiel tended to take a few moments to himself away from the hell around him to think about the memories that made him happy, even if the subject matter wasn’t the most cheerful. He was taking one of those moments when suddenly everything became white light and static, and he was ripped from the daydream of one of Dean’s smiles, reaching to cover his head against the sudden sensory onslaught—and then it was gone, leaving him only with temporarily blindness and one hell of a headache. He groaned, dropping his arms.

“Castiel Novak?”

Castiel jumped. A woman stood before him in a loose light white button-up and slacks, her hair dark red, her brown eyes bright, her smile crooked and kind; Castiel already didn’t trust her.

He blinked up at her, unused to the added light. She watched him patiently, her smile unwavering.

“Yes,” he finally responded, coming to his senses. “Yes, I’m Castiel. Who are you?”

Her smile widened, but she did not answer his question. “Castiel,” she said softly, “do you wish to be saved?”

He didn’t understand what she was asking, or who she was or what that meant, and he couldn’t seem to understand what was happening in the slightest—all he knew was that he opened his mouth and said, “Yes.”

And then the white light became too much to handle.

*

One year hadn’t been enough.

Castiel, Sam, and Dean were trapped in an office room in a home in Indiana, holding off against Lilith weakly, and that was when Castiel’s time ran out. The first toll of the clock struck loudly for midnight, and Lilith, in Ruby’s vessel, started laughing.

“No!” Dean yelled desperately, but he like the rest of them were helpless. Lilith grinned around at them, and Castiel went pale; he was the only one for all but the demon who could see the hellhounds, and they were so much more horrible than he thought they would be. Castiel couldn’t look away from them, his stomach flipping at just the thought of those claws, those _teeth_ . . .

“Oh dear,” Lilith said. “Isn’t it time for my puppies to take your soul to Hell, Castiel? They’re very, very hungry, after all.”

The dogs snarled, watching him like he was a big slab of meat. And, technically, he was.

“But not yet,” Lilith told the dogs, turning her unforgiving eyes on Dean. “No—first, I have something I have been dying to do for a long time now.”

She raised her hand, pointing it straight at Dean’s heart, and her eyes went white as a white light formed in her palm, and Castiel didn’t know what it was other than that it would kill Dean. That was all he needed to know.

“No!” Castiel screamed, leaving the protective circle the hellhounds could not cross to stand in front of Dean firmly, choosing to protect him instead. Shocked, Lilith snapped back to normal, and all Castiel could do was whisper the same word again: “ _No_.”

“You poor thing,” Lilith murmured pityingly, looking Castiel in the eye. “You sold your soul to save his brother, and now you choose to save him over your own life—you must really love him.”

Castiel didn’t have the time to see either Sam or Dean’s reaction before Lilith moved to the side, allowing for a more open doorway, and told Castiel, “I hope for your sake they kill you quickly.”

And then the dogs were on him.

They ripped, and they tore, and Castiel lost track of if he was screaming or not, but he certainly knew that he didn’t die quickly at all. It hurt everywhere, and he could feel himself covered in blood and drowning in it, and he heard Lilith scream something before she was gone, and all Castiel could comprehend was Dean’s screaming.

Castiel was barely aware, nearly as an out-of-body experience, that Dean was grabbing his shoulders and yelling his name, tears rolling down his face. Castiel remembered smiling, or at least trying to. He remembered everything suddenly stopping, and he assumed that was when he had died.

But he knew that he had at least died in Dean’s arms, and that was a nice thought.


	2. Lazarus Rising

Castiel gasped in air like a drowning man.

Every sense was rushing to him at once, like they had been dulled but now they were maximized. The air was dizzying, overwhelming, and every joint in his body had that feeling of pins and needles. Everything was dark—and it smelled of dirt—and Castiel was suddenly and overwhelmingly panicked and confused. His instincts were screaming in the back of his muddled mind that something was wrong.

“Hel—” he started to scream—either to yell ‘hello’ or ‘help’, he wasn’t sure—but his word caught in his extremely dry throat, and he wheezed, coughing so dryly that it was painful. He looked around him and reached in front of him, only to have his hand connect with something wooden.

Castiel steeled himself, and then slammed his hand against it. Dirt suddenly flooded into his face, filling the hole that the broken pieces had left.

He was buried alive.

Castiel tried to yell again, but ended up with the same result and a mouth filled with grave dirt. He ducked his head, coughing violently, adrenaline pumping dangerously fast. His line of work allowed for a fear of few things—but no monster ever wanted to simply bury someone alive for fun.

Castiel closed his eyes, listening to his pounding heartbeat, counting them in an attempt to calm himself. The pine box he was in was breaking; there was only one option if he wanted to survive.

Castiel inhaled a shaky breath, and then pounded at the box, breaking the hole wider and being invaded by even more dirt, but now he had enough room to sit up. He breathed as calmly as he could, clawing through the dirt, lifting himself through endless dark, managing to propel himself hard enough upward—

His hand broke through the upper layer of grass and into the open air, and the cold sent a shock through his body.

He managed to get both of his arms onto the surface and got a firm enough hold that he was able to pull most of his upper body up, gasping in air desperately the moment he broke free, coughing dryly against the cold air. Castiel dragged the rest of his body above the surface, sprawling on the rough grass as he coughed, finally free.

When he managed to finally catch his breath, he looked around—the first thing he found was a lopsided cross made out of sticks and twine at the head of his gravesite, and his heart felt heavy as he imagined Dean and Sam constructing it next to a mound of newly piled dirt. But then he noticed something else—and his breath caught in horror. He pushed himself up to his feet, looking around.

All around the area where he had once been buried was nothing but dead grass and felled trees.

It looked like a nuclear warzone, and he felt sick, knowing that this could only have to do with his unexpected reappearing act.

Castiel looked around at the area of destruction, stretching about a hundred foot radius around his ground zero, and whispered to himself and the wind, “What the hell?”

*

It didn’t take long for Castiel to realize there was nothing around the spot he was buried—no homes or traffic on the road or anything beyond his radioactive gravesite. The isolation was normal for a hunter’s send-off, but he spent most of his long, stumbling walk considering that—wondering why the Winchesters had chosen to bury him, when hunters, even their own father, were traditionally burnt on a pyre. He had a million unanswered questions, but none of them were as important as _how_.

Castiel nearly lost his balance when he spotted a building up ahead of him—the only one in the miles he had been walking. He jogged closer, speeding up when he realized it was a gas station. He made it to the door, looking around the inside through the window, and he rasped something that sounded like a hello but received no response. He glanced the length of the dirt road it sat on once more—although he hadn’t seen a soul on it for the hours he had been walking on it.

Castiel threw his elbow into the glass pane over the handle and it shattered, allowing him to let himself into the small empty gas station. He shouldered open the door, heading straight to the coolers, hoping on miracles he didn’t believe in that they would at least have water.

And they did. Castiel chugged one in ten seconds or less before stumbling to the candy counter and not giving a single shit as he ate a Milky Way or three. Castiel grabbed a plastic bag from behind the counter and filled it with a few more water bottles and chocolate bars, setting it on the counter as he looked around. He stuffed a bag of chips in as well before stumbling toward the bathroom, reaching out with his dirt-blackened hands to turn on the warm water.

He scrubbed the dirt from his hands before splashing water on his face and into his hair, watching from his reflection in the mirror above the sink as the water rivulets rolled down his face, creating lines of skin through the dirt. He shrugged off his worn leather jacket and froze.

He saw it first in the mirror—a large, swollen, reddened handprint around his wrist, like someone had grabbed him and burnt him with just the heat of their hand. He raised it close to his face, reaching his other hand to touch it, and he hissed a breath through his teeth at the flash of pain, ripping his hand away.

Well, that certainly wasn’t normal.

Castiel gave the handprint a wide berth as he scrubbed the dirt from his skin the best as he could with one hand and cheap hand soap, and he pulled the jacket back on as he emerged into the main room of the gas station, feeling significantly more human. He noticed a pile of newspapers on top of the counter and he grabbed one quickly, eagerly reading for the details, and he stopped short, blinking.

How the fuck did he get to Illinois?

And the date; same year, but—

“September?” he muttered, the paper dropping to the counter. He felt sick—had it really only been _four months_?

In Hell years, he knew he had been there for nearly four decades. But here, it was only four _months_?

He didn’t even get the chance to consider it in greater detail before it hit him with the force of a freight train—a loud shrieking slammed into the gas station with such a physical force that it blew out all the glass in the building and knocked Castiel hard off of his feet. He reached up to cover his head, the sound like nails on a chalkboard times millions, when it was suddenly gone, and Castiel heard a voice that could never be mistaken for being human whisper one word like a laugh—his name.

As quickly as it came, it was gone.

Castiel shot back onto his feet, turning frantically to glance around him at what might have said his name. When he found nothing, he grabbed for the change in the cash register and his bag of miscellaneous groceries, stumbling out of the building and into the dirt parking lot, moving to an old car parked off into the grass. He dumped everything into the passenger seat before ducking low and ripping free the wires, muttering prayers weakened by a lacking belief as he struck them together, the engine falling short each time.

He let out a curse and tried one more time—and the engine caught, the dashboard lighting up to show that the old clunker had nearly an entire tank filled with gas.

 _God must actually be on my side today_ , he thought sourly as he threw the car into drive and pealed out of the parking lot, leaving his grave and every odd thing that had happened to him in the last several hours in his rearview mirror, knowing exactly where he had to go.

*

He had resurfaced somewhere outside of Pontiac, Illinois—it took many hours and two more stolen cars before Castiel made it to Nebraska, and he pulled up into the half-full parking lot of Harvelle’s Roadhouse, more than a little disappointed that he didn’t find a black 1967 Chevy Impala among the cars out front. Castiel parked the stolen minivan with the plates facing away from the street and he pulled himself out of the car, feeling a lot less dead than he had a few hours ago.

He didn’t realize that not only had he been dead for four months, but he was also walking into a bar full of _hunters_ until he was already pushing the door open, and he hoped the punch line to the joke about the undead guy walking into a bar of people who hunted them didn’t end with him getting a sucker punch to the face and a stake through his heart.

He took a step into the room, the familiar smell of must and peanuts and hard liquor rolling over him, and he realized how much he had missed this place.

“Castiel?” a hunter Castiel knew only because he tended to frequent the Roadhouse demanded, sounding surprised as he got to his feet from his table with a couple of buddies by the door to clap Castiel on the back as he hovered there, uncertain. “I heard you were dead, man! What happened?”

“I came back to life,” Castiel responded truthfully, offering an off smile as he walked to the bar, throwing over his shoulder, “I’ll let you know how later.”

The hunters guffawed from the table, thinking he was joking. To hunters, death _had_ to be a joke, or else they would never be able to get up in the morning.

Castiel moved to lean against the bar, turning to look around at the Roadhouse—everything was the same. Nothing had changed, even in all the time it had been since he was there last. Drunken hunters still crowded the shooting videogames and hustled each other at pool, drinking away their worries of not living long enough to see tomorrow. It was a life that Castiel both loved and hated, and he wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.

“Hey, buddy,” a familiar voice stated behind him. “Want something to drink?”

Castiel turned around, barely able to breathe. “Jo,” he said happily, smiling at her.

Jo had a completely different reaction, one that was understandable—she dropped the glass she had been holding and it shattered on the ground as she screamed, jumping away from him.

All the hunters’ eyes snapped to them, all of them reaching reflexively for the nearest weapon. Castiel’s eyes widened, holding up his hands as if in surrender.

“Jo, it’s okay—it’s me,” he assured her desperately. Her face was pale, and her hands were shaking as she fumbled blindly for the knife she kept at her waistband, her wide eyes unmoving from his face, horrified. “Jo, would I be stupid enough to walk into a room of hunters if I was anyone other than _me_?”

“You died four months ago,” she replied softly, finally getting a hold on her knife and raising it threateningly. “Dean told us—he was there, he _buried_ you.”

“Jo,” Castiel began, but he cut off at a sharp pain at the back of his neck, jumping in surprise, whirling around. Ellen stood behind him with a silver knife in her hand, a hollow look in her eyes as she spat, “ _Christo_.”

“I’m not a demon or a shifter or anything else,” Castiel pleaded with her, still holding his hands up. “Please, Ellen, I’m just alive—I don’t know how.”

She looked at him for a long moment, her eyes staring into his, flashing to look at his face like she was expecting something to be wrong with him, and, when her eyes moved back to his, she suddenly looked so shocked and relieved.

“Castiel?” she demanded, dropping her knife hand. “Is that you?”

“I am so sorry,” Castiel apologized, though he wasn’t sure for what. “Ellen, I—”

She threw her arms around him, cutting off his words with a relieved laugh, holding him like a mother and he was smiling again. She pulled away with signs of tears in her eyes, and she reached up and touched his shoulder, smiling that subtle smile of hers that always managed to speak volumes.

“I guess we need to have a talk about what is going on with you, then,” she said, squeezing her hand on his shoulder before glancing behind him at her daughter. “You can handle this lot, right, Jo?”

“Sure,” Jo said weakly, staring at Castiel, dumbfounded. “Yeah. Sure, okay. God, I need a drink.”

Ellen grabbed Castiel’s wrist, the unbranded one, and quickly led him to the back part of the Roadhouse, where even the regular patrons never saw—where Ellen, Jo, and Ash lived. Castiel opened his mouth to thank Ellen for trusting him when she turned, and he suddenly had a face and mouth full of holy water.

He coughed and sputtered on the water, blinking through the water in his eyes to glare at the older woman. “Damn it, Ellen, you already tested me for this!”

“I haven’t ever been a big fan of the eye test,” she told him with a cheeky smirk, pushing open the door to the basement, where she normally put extra guests on the rickety cots. “Now, go get some sleep—you look like shit—and we’ll talk once I clear out this feral lot, agreed?”

“Fair enough,” Castiel muttered, still grumpy as he continued to blink away the extra water in his eyes.

She grinned up at him, looking so much younger—like a weigh had been lifted. “It is damn good to see you again, Castiel,” she told him softly, not one to outright show vulnerable emotion but he could hear it in her voice, and it was more than enough to know how much she meant those words.

“Thanks, Ellen,” he murmured, and she left him standing there after a pat on the arm, and sleep suddenly seemed like the last thing on his mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you guys so much for your awesome support! Sorry that this chapter is a little on the short side, but the next chapter will hopefully make up for it!


	3. City of the Damned

He didn’t remember going down into the basement, or falling asleep, and it felt like one second had gone by before Jo nudged him awake, murmuring that she was sorry but they had to talk, and he made his way back upstairs after a brief hug and reunion to the closest thing he had ever had to a little sister. They made it upstairs to find Ellen drinking a beer at the bar, the rest of the Roadhouse completely cleared out, Ash passed out cold on one of the pool tables like he usually was when no one else was around.

“What happened to you, Castiel?” Ellen murmured, barely giving him the time to sit down on a stool beside her. She turned to him, her eyes hiding pain the way they always were. “Dean called us four months ago sounding ripped apart and told us your year was up, and he and Sam were burying you in the middle of the woods. Do they know you’re up and kicking?”

“Not that I am aware of,” he replied, leaning into the bar. “I woke up six feet under in a pine box, not a soul around for miles.”

“How?” Ellen asked, and she didn’t need to clarify a thing.

Castiel just shook his head. He wished he knew.

“What happened?” Jo demanded, chewing her lip. “After the, uh, hellhound thing, I mean.”

Castiel took a deep breath, and he told them everything that they needed to hear.

He told them he didn’t remember a damn thing.

And he watched them believe him.

Jo sat silently, watching him like he was turning water into wine or something. Ellen was just looking at him like she was expecting to find out reality wasn’t as real as she hoped it was, and something twisted in his stomach because he almost hadn’t expected them to be so pleased to see him.

Castiel asked, “Have you heard from Sam and Dean lately?”

“Not since they gave us the news about what happened to you,” Jo told him, shaking her head. “Kinda didn’t know what to say after that, I guess.”

“So you have no idea where they are?”

“We could probably find out for you,” Ellen replied, her eyes narrowing. “Are you sure you want to jump back into the game so soon after—?”

“I don’t know what else I could possible do,” Castiel admitted, and then cleared his throat self-consciously. “Anyway, I think that Sam and Dean deserve to know, after all of that . . .”

“Dean was really broken up about what happened that day on the phone,” she supplied, eyeing him closely. “Must not have been easy for him, considering you died for his brother.”

Castiel let nothing show.

“I suppose it must have been important for him to know what you would give,” Ellen finished off slyly, shrugging like she hadn’t just been speaking in code. Jo hid a smirk behind her hair. Castiel could have sworn that he saw Ash’s sleeping body start shaking with laughter.

Castiel bit his tongue, hoping that would be enough to stop him from blushing, but knowing it ultimately wouldn’t do anything for the matter. “I hate you all,” he told them.

Jo burst out laughing before throwing her arms around his neck, grinning at him. “Missed you too . . . _Cas_.”

Castiel groaned as Ash definitely started laughing from where he was laying on the pool table, and Castiel rolled his eyes. Castiel shook Jo off, holding the cold beer in between his hands and staring at it as Ellen spoke lowly to someone on the phone, looking for the Winchester boys—Castiel wanted to smile just at the thought of seeing them again.

But seeing them again was going to be much more different than this reunion had been—especially if they still remember the way Lilith so easily announced how enamored he was with the eldest Winchester brother.

There was literally no possible way that was going to go well—but Castiel owed them an explanation.

He wasn’t sure how long it was later when Ellen’s voice shook him back into awareness—long enough that Ash had rolled off of the pool table and ambled back to his room with a quick hello again to Castiel, long enough that Castiel’s beer was now room temperature in between his palms—and he thought he would have an aneurism when she slowly told him, “Bobby found them.”

“And?” he asked eagerly. “Where are they?”

Ellen got that look on her face. The look she always got when she was about to deliver some bad news that someone might not be prepared to hear.

“They are in Illinois, about ten miles outside of where you just sprang out of the soil,” she told him cautiously. “Apparently, they just got there a day or so ago—and Bobby says that they aren’t working on a job.”

_Then why would they be there?_

Ellen’s expression was right—he _definitely_ wasn’t prepared to hear that. He almost wished he hadn’t asked, like he would have the strength to actually let the Winchesters go.

He shot to his feet, nearly knocking over the barstool as he grabbed the stolen van’s keys from the counter. “Thanks, Ellen,” he said, ducking forward to kiss her on the cheek before moving quickly for the exit. “I promise I’ll call you as soon as I get to a phone.”

“You better!” she called to his retreating back, and then he was suddenly behind the wheel and heading back the way he had come, fear and dread gripping his stomach.

_What had they done?_

He pushed harder on the gas pedal and pointed his car in the direction of Pontiac, Illinois, hell-bent on finding out.

*

The Nite Owl Motel was just another establishment on their list of seedy places they have stayed in. Cheap rooms were payable by the hour and the sheets always smelt of cheating husband and disappointment. The life of a hunter wasn’t glamorous, but these shitty motels were always one of the constants—there is always one everywhere, the same thing with a different name and different stains—but their presence was always something that a hunter could rely on.

This motel was only different because of the spotless antique car in the parking lot. That was the only thing that could alter Castiel’s view of the same damn motels.

He drove around the block and abandoned the minivan with the key in the ignition in front of an empty Laundromat. He walked leisurely back to the motel with his hands in his jacket pockets, running over and over what he was going to say to Sam and Dean when they opened the door.

Castiel didn’t realize the flaw to his plan until he was already in the building.

He had no idea what their room number was.

He awkwardly paced the hall of the first floor, listening for their voices, but he only heard things he would have been fine with never having heard, so he continued his search on the second floor, almost ready to hand in his pride and just ask the guy at the front desk when he reached the end of the hall, and the door was slightly cracked open.

He heard Dean’s voice first. Of course.

“You know, this would be a whole lot less painful if you stopped speaking in riddles, bitch,” Dean growled lowly, and Castiel felt like he had been punched in the stomach—it was strange enough feeling like he was looking in on Dean’s life when he was standing right next to him, but it was a whole other level of weird doing it in secret when now Dean knew how Castiel felt about him.

Nevertheless, Castiel softly crept closer, listening harder.

“I don’t _know_ what is going on,” a female voice snapped back at Dean angrily. “I’m not exactly trusted with a wealth of information here, asshole.”

“Just tell us what you know one more time,” Sam’s voice mediated exhaustedly, like he had to put up with this bickering way too often.

There was the sound of fabric rustling, like someone was pacing, before the woman spoke again. “Hell is up to something big—don’t give me that look; I’m not down there to see firsthand what’s going on. But it’s big, and super hush-hush. Whatever it is, everyone is keeping their mouths shut about it, so this isn’t just big—it’s nuclear.”

“Ruby,” Sam said, and Castiel felt like his body had just received an electric shock. “Is there anything you could find out about what they are planning?”

“Maybe,” she said, “but I doubt it.”

Castiel became sick of waiting—he pushed open the door softly, slipping soundlessly into the room. Dean and Sam were both standing with their backs to him, completely oblivious, and a petite brunette woman stood in front of them, her arms crossed as she looked up to the side, her head tilted as if she was listening to something, obviously thinking about Sam’s request. Castiel softly closed the door back to where it had been and crossed his arms, leaning back against the door jam as he stared down Ruby in her new vessel, distrust curling uncomfortably in his chest.

“I’ll look into it the best I can,” New Ruby told the Winchester brothers, turning to look at them with pursed lips. “But we’ve been over that there are many things I can’t—” Her eyes landed on Castiel, and her face paled in the same second she jumped back with a muffled scream, staring at him like she was petrified.

“I’ve been getting that response a lot lately,” Castiel said casually, smirking at her, some part of him liking how terrified she looked to see him. At the sound of his voice, Dean and Sam spun around, their faces masks of surprise, and Castiel couldn’t help but to hope his pose looked more casually badass than like he was trying too hard to _look_ casually badass.

Sam stared at him, simply just speechless, but Dean’s reaction was much more heartbreaking. Dean stumbled forward a step, looking lost, and whispered, “Cas?”

“Hello, Dean,” Castiel greeted the way he always did, and Dean’s face clouded over with a mixture of relief and disbelief. He moved like he was about to step closer again before leaning back on his heel, thinking better of it.

“How?” Dean demanded, a catch in his voice, and he glanced back at Sam and Ruby as if expecting them to tell him that it was some sick joke, like Castiel was just a projection. When he turned back to meet Castiel’s eyes, he was significantly more sickly looking. “How is this possible?”

“I’m not the first person in this room to come back from the dead,” he pointed out, smiling at little at his own joke even though he didn’t find it to be that funny. Dean blinked at him, staring like he was trying to figure something out. Castiel held up his hands. “It’s me—I’ll prove it.”

He pulled a silver knife slowly out of his waistband and sliced a small cut on the back of his hand while his rapt audience of three watched closely, Ruby in terror and the Winchesters in caution. He put the knife back in the holster before he calmly said, “ _Christo_ ,” and Sam and Dean looked between Ruby’s blackened eyes and Castiel’s unaffected ones.

Sam moved forward first, closing the space between him and Castiel in only a couple of steeps before he threw his arms around him, laughing once as he thumped him hard on the back.

“Good to have you back, Cas,” Sam told him as he stepped away, beaming. Castiel couldn’t help but to offer a smile in return, too infected by Sam’s contagious emotions.

“Thanks, Sam,” he replied softly before turning to look back at Dean, who still had that same expression on his face. “Dean—”

Dean stepped forward and grabbed him into an embrace tighter than the bear hug Sam had caught him in, his arms squeezing around his shoulders, and Castiel managed to respond, hugging him back, taking a deep breath of comfort and Dean—home.

“Jesus, Cas,” Dean muttered quietly enough that only Castiel could hear. “Don’t scare us like that again, you hear me?”

Castiel laughed once, weakly, and Dean pulled away with a firm squeeze to his shoulder, Dean’s unearthly green eyes shining with something Castiel couldn’t understand. Dean moved back until they were too far to touch, curling his hands into tight fists, and Castiel blinked, feeling rather confused.

Sam looked between the two of them, seeming almost amused.

Ruby stood frozen, rooted to one spot, still staring at Castiel in near terror.

“What happened to you, man?” Sam demanded, waving his hand in a gesture like that was supposed to tell Castiel what he meant, and Castiel actually understood. He shrugged unhelpfully.

“I’m not sure,” he told them. “I woke up in a coffin a day and a half ago and, when I got to the surface, the gravesite was . . . demolished.”

“What do you mean?” Dean asked, crossing his arms. Castiel had long since made it a habit to attempt to not get distracted by Dean’s mannerisms, but they caught his eye every damn time.

“It was,” Castiel said, trailing off, lost and searching for the right words to describe it. “ _Bizarre_. Everywhere around the gravesite looked like a bomb had gone off. The trees were fallen over, and all the plants were dead.” Castiel looked right at Ruby as he added, “Nuclear, indeed.”

“You think demons had something to do with you reappearing act?” Dean demanded, glancing quickly to Ruby. Castiel shrugged, staring at Ruby as her eyes suddenly widened.

“ _Nuclear_ ,” she suddenly muttered in shock before starting two steps toward Castiel. “There’s something off about you.”

“Well, I’m supposed to be dead,” he remarked smartly.

“No,” she said, and then pointed at his wrist, the one with the brand covered away and hidden. “What’s that?”

All expression dropped from his face as he told her flatly, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

She suddenly surged forward, slamming him against the wall with more strength than Castiel had assumed a body as small as hers could have managed. Dean yelled “hey!” and Sam started forward, but Ruby moved faster—she grabbed Castiel’s sleeve and yanked it up to the elbow, revealing the handprint burn.

Ruby quickly let go of him, jumping away. Dean and Sam both stared at the burn, uncomprehending.

“ _Angels_ ,” she hissed in both an exclamation and a curse, her eyes wild. “That’s impossible—you _can’t_ be—”

She stumbled back, her eyes widening. Castiel stared at her in shock, hearing the same word on repeat through his head again and again, unable to believe it.

“ _You_ are—” she began to state, and then her face went blank. “I have to go.”

“Wait,” Castiel said, reaching out to grab her arm as she rushed past. She sprang away from him, looking panicked and disturbed and—and she looked like she was trying not to laugh.

She stared at Castiel for only a few more seconds before she turned away and rushed out the door, slamming it behind her, leaving the rest of them behind completely dumbstruck. Castiel looked up at Dean and Sam, eyes wide and shocked, and he found both of the brothers staring at the unnatural burn on his wrist.

“Angels,” Dean said like he was testing the word on his tongue before laughing and shaking his head incredulously. “Well, shit. I think I need a drink.”

And Sam and Castiel could do nothing but agree.


	4. Guardian Angel

The three didn’t speak again until they had collected the twelve pack from the fridge and all had an open beer in front of them, sitting around the small table in the motel’s smaller kitchenette, a surprisingly classy addition to the room in Castiel’s opinion—unless all the moans and thumps he had heard in the majority of the rooms downstairs were from an overjoy of baking. Castiel shrugged off his jacket, throwing it over the back of the unsteady wooden chair, making sure the sleeve of his sweater stayed firmly over the weird handprint that—apparently—came from the glory of an angel burning into his skin.

Both of the brothers suddenly seemed unsure, uncertain. Castiel guessed it was hard to make small talk with people who had just come back from the dead.

“What happened with Lilith?” Castiel asked a little too loudly into the awkward silence, stopping to clear his throat, wincing. “After the, ah, hellhounds. I didn’t really catch . . .”

“You missed the craziest part of the party,” Dean joked weakly, eyes tight—maybe he was aware of how obviously Castiel was avoiding the subject of the last thing that Lilith had said to him. “Lilith tried to give Sam that weird light trick thing, and it probably should have vaporized him, but nothing happened so she freaked the fuck out and bolted out of the meat suit and took off.”

“It didn’t _work_?” Castiel demanded, dumbfounded, looking between them. “Why?”

Sam shrugged, equally as clueless. “I have no idea, but she looked completely terrified about her mojo not working.”

“Do you think it might have to do with your psychic thing?”

“Maybe,” Sam admitted, making a face. “I don’t know—we didn’t really have the chance to think about it much after—”

Sam winched, cutting off before he said it, but they all knew where he was going. Dean shot Sam a warning look before turning back to Castiel, and Castiel just smiled lamely down at his beer bottle, suddenly not up to drinking his feelings away, because there was only one place this conversation could end up.

“You can ask,” he said to them, glancing up from the bottle and immediately meeting Dean’s eyes. “It’s not like I don’t expect you to.”

“We don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, Cas,” Dean said, and Castiel’s chest expanded with emotion at the nickname Dean had coined for him so long ago— _Cas_. Castiel held Dean’s gaze, stroking his fingers against the beer bottle, before he looked away and leaned back, folding his hands on the table.

“You can ask me whatever you want to,” Castiel told them, “but I can’t say that you will like the answers.”

Sam glanced at Dean before asking Castiel gently, “What, ah—what happened to you, in Hell?”

Castiel let out the breath he had been holding and said, “I don’t remember. I don’t remember a damn thing; probably for the best, really.”

Sam nodded slowly, no further questions, but Dean said steadily, “Bullshit.”

Castiel’s gaze snapped to Dean, and he was sure his face betrayed his surprise. Sam’s eyebrows pulled together in a silent question to his brother, but Dean’s eyes were only on Castiel, shining with intensity, making Castiel’s stomach flip uncomfortably because having Dean see him the way it seemed he actually might fucking terrified him.

“What?” Sam asked, looking between Castiel and Dean. Neither of them paid him any attention.

“That ‘I don’t remember’ thing is bullshit, and you know it,” Dean told Castiel fiercely, his eyes flashing. “You’re not the same Castiel as you were before you died—it wouldn’t take a genius to notice that, so stop looking at me like I am fucking crazy. Something about you has changed—I can see right through you.”

Castiel couldn’t help but to wonder how this had happened—he spent all his time paying attention to Dean, so how could he not have noticed Dean paying him the same amount of attention?

Dean stared him down, stubborn, but he didn’t realize the price of what he was asking. He didn’t know the extent of the horror that Castiel had witnessed, and he didn’t realize that the thought of answering the question honestly paralyzed Castiel with terror.

He didn’t have to answer it now, he knew that; the brothers would respect his wishes if he asked them for more time. But they would inevitably ask again, and he wouldn’t be able to avoid answering that time.

So it was about answering now and ripping off the Band-Aid, or letting the wound fester. He knew he would have put it off if this would have happened before Hell, but Dean was right—he was a different person now.

“Time goes by a lot differently in Hell,” Castiel told them, keeping eye contact with Dean stubbornly, almost angrily—but a lot sadly. “What was four months up here was closer to forty years in Hell. Forty slow, long years.” His voice cracked when he whispered, “That’s a long time to burn.”

Dean cursed under his breath, his face falling. “Cas, damn it, I’m sorry.”

“I can’t talk about Hell right now,” he told them honestly, shaking his head—he vowed to never tell the Winchesters about the way he had been tortured or about how he had done the torturing—he didn’t want to see that look of devastation on their faces again for as long as he lived. He straightened up and slapped on a mask as he said, “It doesn’t matter anymore—it’s not important. I think we have bigger and better things to worry about.”

Sam cleared his throat, sitting up straighter. “Right—uh, well, I guess the angel thing should be something we check out. Do you know how you got that?” He nodded toward Castiel’s wrist.

Castiel frowned. “I feel like I should—but everything is really fuzzy about how I got out.”

“Maybe they wiped your memory of it or something?” Dean demanded before sighing, his head falling into his hands. “This is so fucked, man—we don’t know how to deal with angels.”

“I didn’t even know that they were real,” Sam stated, wonder in his voice as he shook his head incredulously. “And why would they go around in Hell saving people? Why Cas in particular? No offense, Cas.”

It suddenly hit him—Castiel’s eyes closed. “ _Saving_ ,” he murmured, his eyes still closed, laughing humorlessly. “Of course—I thought it was a hallucination—but she was an _angel_.”

“You alright over there, Cas?” Dean asked, actually sounding a little concerned—was Castiel truly that different than he had been, to make Dean sound so worried?

“I just realized—you talked about being saved, Sam—” Castiel began, trying to figure out where to start. “There was this moment, and I thought I was imagining everything but maybe not—there was this woman, in Hell, and she came up to me and knew my name and asked me if I wanted to be saved.”

“A woman?” Dean echoed, raising his eyebrows. “Anything off about her?”

“I think—right before she showed up, there was all this light and this noise, and then she appeared.” Castiel suddenly groaned, slumping back in his chair. “I’m a fucking _idiot_. Right after I clawed myself out of my grave—not recommended, by the way—I made it to this gas station, and something completely blew through it, a really loud sound that cracked all the windows. I think it might have been the same sound.”

“Angels, though,” Dean muttered, sounding exhausted. “Where have they been, all this time?”

Sam and Castiel exchanged a look, both of them not knowing how to answer him—Castiel knew that he and Sam shared a similar belief when it came to God and His angels, and Castiel couldn’t even begin to know how to make excuses for them. Sam and Castiel just didn’t offer any words for their beliefs or any excuses for their prayers.

“I have a question,” Castiel announced, changing the subject easily, his jaw clenching just at the thought of what he was about to say. “Why the hell are you still working with Ruby?”

“We’ve only seen her once or twice since you were sliced and diced,” Dean replied. “She called us and said that activity has been picking up, so we told her to stop in.”

“I’ve never trusted her,” Castiel announced what all three of them already knew well. “Be careful around her—she reminds me of a snake.”

“Just tell us how you really feel, Cas,” Sam snorted.

“And why, of all places, are you _here_?” Castiel demanded, his anger gathering momentum. “Why are you here, not on a hunt, on the day that I mysteriously pop out of the ground scratch-free after four months without a heartbeat?”

Dean’s face suddenly went cold. “We didn’t do anything to bring you back, if that is what you are asking.”

“I just want to know how you knew to be only miles away when I came back to life,” Castiel said plainly, his fists clenched and his eyes unwavering on the brothers. “I just want to make sure no one did something stupid to get someone like me back.”

“ _Someone like you_ ,” Dean growled sharply, eyes flashing. “No one doing something stupid—like _you_ did, when you sold your fucking _soul_?”

“I did it to save Sam!” Castiel snapped back, his voice rising. “I had a damn good reason, and I paid that debt—a life for a life. Bringing me back would be nothing but stupid, and it would ruin the natural order.”

“Well, we didn’t sell our fucking souls for _someone like you_ , if you want to feel so fucking worthless about yourself,” Dean announced harshly, getting to his feet so violently his chair was nearly knocked over in the process. “I’m going to call Bobby—see what he might know about some holy bitches with wings.”

Dean stormed to the door, yanking it open and slamming it shut so hard the door vibrated on its hinges. Castiel felt his heartbeat slowing, his anger dissipating, but he didn’t feel at all that guilty—he _needed_ to know. He had been in this world of the paranormal long enough to know that coincidences barely, if ever, happen.

Castiel simmered in a silence with a motionless Sam, who was sadly staring at the door his brother had just stormed out of. Sam let out a long breath after a minute, turning to look at Castiel across the table.

“We didn’t do anything, Cas,” Sam assured him. “Nothing. We might have tried, but nothing worked, and no demon would deal—so we gave up, and we accepted it. We did nothing. We had no idea that you were alive again—we never would have guessed. Like you said, it’s not exactly the natural order of things.”

Sam reached up and rubbed his face, and it was like he was aging before Castiel’s eyes. Castiel didn’t remember Sam ever looking so sleepless, so worn. He never saw Sam’s shoulders slumped in, like a large weight was pressing down on them. Sam took a long and heavy breath before he looked back up at Castiel, his dark eyes strained and sad.

“We came back here on a break,” Sam explained to him slowly and cautiously, as if he was choosing his words carefully. “We came to visit your grave, Cas—we hadn’t been there since we buried you, and Dean said that he wanted to come back and see it. He hadn’t been able to get himself out the door, though, but I could tell he would have—I think he was finally ready to openly think of you again, to actually _talk_ about you. We came here because I hoped that being here might make him better again. I don’t think you realize how hard he took your death, but he has been suffering and sinking for the last few months—sometimes he was so far gone that he hadn’t noticed that I had been gone for hours and had come back; he would be sitting in the same place, staring at his hands. I was terrified.”

Sam stood up slowly. “I’m not telling you this to make you feel bad or anything, Cas—I just want you to know that these last couple of months haven’t exactly been easy. Especially on Dean.”

Sam crossed to him close enough that he could reach out and put a hand on Castiel’s shoulder, but Castiel was almost too shocked to feel it. He stared up at Sam, utterly speechless.

“It’s great to have you back, man,” he said, and then walked away, leaving Castiel with a whole lot of guilt and even more questions, his hands shaking slightly on the tabletop.

He had been so incredibly wrong. He had assumed the worst about what Dean might do, only to hear that Dean had only been here to visit his memory and reconcile with himself about what had happened to Castiel. Dean had been depressed, and he thought coming back to visit Castiel’s memory might make him feel better again—and Castiel had so easily just gone and made Dean sound like the bad guy.

Dean had cared about Castiel so much that he had tried to make a demon deal and fell into a depression when he failed, and he still hurt so badly four months after—he still wasn’t over it after _four months_ —

Castiel wished he knew what that meant.

Sam sunk down on the couch across the room, opening his laptop—Castiel looked away from him quickly, like he was too nervous to meet his eyes, and buried his head in the circle of his arms on the table, welcoming the peaceful dark and the calming silence interrupted only be the occasional sound of Sam typing . . .

Castiel jerked upright at the sound of something heavy slamming down in front of him, blinking sleep out of his eyes as he looked up and found Dean staring flatly down at him, his face betraying nothing. “I just got off the phone with Bobby—he’s not sure he likes the sound of your guardian angel, so he’s packing up some books and heading here now. Should be here in about ten hours, give or take.”

Castiel blinked, frowning. “What time is it?”

“About midnight,” Dean told him before turning away. “I grabbed your bag from the car—figured you might need it.”

Shocked, Castiel looked back to the heavy object Dean had thrown down in front of him—the blue duffle he had been carting around for years was filled with his belongings, everything that he owned. Castiel looked up at Dean, startled.

Had Dean really kept Castiel’s bag all this time, even after he was long since six feet under?

He suddenly felt like an even bigger ass for being such a dick to Dean earlier. His throat was choked with so much emotion that he was surprised his voice came out as even as it did when he said, “Thank you, Dean.”

Dean offered a small, slightly forced smile, and Castiel knew that they were at least on good terms for now. Dean said, “I’ll take the couch tonight—you look like you need some serious shut-eye.”

“I’m fine on the couch,” Castiel insisted, getting to his feet. “It’s not like I’m going to notice if I’m in a bed or not—it’s no big deal.”

“Cas,” Dean began, sounding annoyed, but Sam interrupted from where he was now laying back on top of one of the beds, “Oh, will you two _please_ stop fighting like an old married couple and just _decide_ already?”

“Couch it is,” Castiel said before Dean could speak, crossing the room to dump his bag next to the lumpy-looking sofa, kicking his shoes off. He looked back at Dean, suddenly nervous. “Dean?”

Dean raised his eyebrows as he shrugged off his jacket, looking at Castiel to show that he was listening. Castiel hesitated for a second.

“I’m sorry, for what I said to you earlier,” he told the man who must still remember what Lilith had said, who must remember that Castiel loves him. Castiel looked right into Dean’s eyes, searching for a sign, any at all. “I just—I don’t know. The last couple days have been a little unbelievable, I guess, and I just completely overreacted and I just—I’m just sorry.”

“Don’t apologize, Cas, it’s fine,” Dean muttered, shrugging weakly. “It’s forgotten.”

And his shoulders were less tense, and his jaw wasn’t clenched anymore, and Castiel was at least willing to keep him as a friend if he could have anything, the worry melting off of him—even the burning handprint on his wrist was forgotten in the air as he realized that he would at least get to keep Dean in his life in some way, even platonic.

Castiel nodded and smiled at Dean sheepishly, and he rolled his eyes in response, turning to ask his brother something. Castiel sat down on the couch, letting his head fall back onto the wall, and he relaxed as he let out a long breath, closing his eyes.


	5. Rude Awakenings

Castiel woke to the sound of Bobby Singer’s voice saying, “I don’t know what to think about this, Dean.”

“All I know is that Cas is back,” Dean replied softly, but just loud enough that Castiel could hear it from the couch in the motel room, frozen, trying not to move like he might break the spell, not wanting them to know that he was listening while they talked about him. “It’s the craziest thing—he just showed up, apparently after clawing his way out of his own grave, and he has this freaky handprint on his wrist that Ruby bugged out about, saying that it’s angels. This whole thing is strange, Bobby, but look on the bright side—Cas is alive, so now you and Sam don’t have to sneakily gossip on the phone about if I’m okay or not.”

“I’m not going to apologize,” Bobby announced stubbornly, and Castiel imagined the man narrowing his eyes. “You were in a bad place for a while, boy, and it scared the shit out of us.”

“Yeah, I know,” Dean muttered, wincing, kicking his boots at the ground sheepishly like a guilty kid. “But you didn’t see it, Bobby—he was fucking ripped to shreds. His entire chest, stomach, it all was ribbons. But, now, he’s perfectly fine, like nothing happened.”

“Weird,” Bobby muttered, and a chair scraped quietly on the floor, alerting Castiel that they were sitting down around the table by the kitchenette. “I supposed the angels must have patched him up a bit before they shoved him back into his body. Probably wouldn’t have done them any good if he just bled out again.”

Dean scuffed at the ground again before he asked, “What would angels want with him, Bobby?”

“Creatures usually do things selfishly,” Bobby reminded Dean patiently, almost as if he was speaking to a child, and Castiel would have been irritated by that if he didn’t know that Bobby was just trying to steer Dean away from remembering the night with the hellhounds—Castiel couldn’t see his face, but he had seen Dean’s face after they had watched Sam die, and he figured it probably looked something like that, and he would have done anything to distract him as well. Bobby sighed, the chair whining slightly as he leaned too far back into the old wood. “It’s a good question, though. You said Cas talked about it calling him by name?”

“Yeah. He said it asked him if he wanted to be saved.”

“Alright.” There was the sound of the flipping pages of a book. Castiel tried to continue to breathe evenly, to pretend to be asleep, relaxing his muscles. “I don’t have much lore on angels—not many people have seen or heard from then since Biblical times, but—”

He must have fallen asleep, and he must have been having a bit of a nightmare, because the next thing he knew he was waking up with a muffled cry, his body flying off of the couch of his own accord, not thinking it through because Castiel bashed his head on the coffee table, groaning loudly when he hit the ground. He heard chairs screeching against the linoleum as the people at the table stood up, and Dean was the first to call, “Cas? You okay?”

Castiel reached up and touched a spot over his eye where his skin was pulsing, and he sighed a little when his fingers came back slightly stained with blood.

“I think I’m bleeding,” he groaned, rolling onto his back and sitting up, blinking past the sleep in his eyes.

Sam and Dean were standing at the table and Bobby was sitting up straight, looking at him in surprise. Sam looked like he was trying not to laugh despite himself, and Dean looked like he was torn between laughing and frowning.

“Well, at least we know you’re as clumsy as ever,” Dean replied, rolling his eyes before stalking to the bathroom and walking over to hand Castiel a wad of toilet paper for his eye, and Castiel accepted it with a halfhearted glare. Dean offered a hand to help him up and Castiel hesitated only a second before he took it, and his head only spun a little bit when he was on his feet. He looked around at the room, biting back a yawn.

“Long time no see, Bobby,” Castiel greeted the man weakly, offering him a tired smile. Bobby chuckled under his breath, shaking his head slightly.

“You’re a mess, kid,” Bobby told Castiel, and he laughed in response.

“You’re telling me,” he said, walking with Dean over to the kitchenette. “Someone tell me we have food here.”

“Stale coffee cake,” Sam told him, throwing the box to him, and Castiel managed to catch it with one hand. He set it down on the counter and checked the toilet paper, throwing it away when he decided he wasn’t going to actually bleed anymore, crossing back over to open the box and take a bit of the coffee cake.

It was literally the best thing he had ever eaten.

His stomach turned, and he realized something.

“I must be really hungry if this tastes good to me,” he muttered just loudly enough that the others might have been able to hear it before he crossed to sit at the unused chair, the one with his coat still hung over the back. He reached back into one of the pockets of his jacket and pulled out one of the candy bars he had stolen. He grinned. “Ha. Livin’ on a prayer.”

“Someone’s in a good mood,” Sam said cautiously, staring at him with wide eyes. “How hard did you hit your head?”

Castiel rolled his eyes at him, not wanting to announce to the world that he only felt so good because he had woken up in the same room as the people he had missed the most. “I actually got sleep for the first time since I pulled a Lazarus—what time is it?”

“Four o’clock,” Dean replied as Bobby went, “Lazarus?”

“Sixteen hours of sleep,” Castiel muttered to himself appreciatively before turning to Bobby with a grin. “Come on, Bobby, I know you’ve read the Bible.”

But Sam had stopped too, his eyebrows pilling together. “He was the one who Jesus brought to life, right?”

“‘I am the resurrection and the life’,” Castiel quoted around his candy bar mechanically from his many years at a religious orphanage. “‘He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.’ But it’s not like Lazarus is the only one to die and pop back up to life in the Bible, Bobby. Don’t give me that look.”

“I ain’t givin’ you any look,” Bobby muttered, giving him a look. “Just thought it was funny you brought that up.”

Castiel shrugged and leaned back into the chair, crossing his arms. “So, Bobby, what you got on angels?”

“Diddly squat, that’s what I got,” Bobby growled, frowning. “No one has seen them around for much more than a couple of centuries, and even those sources are questionable. The only time angels seemed to have announced their presence was back in the Biblical days, and I think it’s safe to say the ones that wrote them down were a little biased.”

“What, you think they’re evil?” Castiel asked, surprised. Sam sighed.

“I don’t know what to think about any of this,” Sam announced tiredly. “All I know is that angels freak out demons, and that angels broke into Hell to steal back Cas. They don’t seem that bad, really.”

“They’re God’s little toy soldiers,” Bobby pointed out, tapping his finger insistently on one of the books in front of him. “I’m a little wary about something that might get its power from Heaven.”

“This is too big for us,” Dean muttered, running a hand through his hair. “What the hell are we supposed to do with angels?”

“Hopefully not fight them,” Bobby snorted, “because I see no way to kill them anywhere in these books. And there are so many stories about people dealing with angels on the Internet that I can’t bring myself to trust any of them. Anyway, they wouldn’t exactly be trying to _kill_ an angel, if they saw one, so still no go on that.”

“Let’s hope we won’t have to be fighting them, then,” Dean muttered, “as if we have ever come across one creature we _don’t_ have to be fighting.”

Bobby sighed.

Eventually, they all fell into their work—they each took a book and moved to different parts of the room to start researching. Sam and Bobby kept to the kitchen table, both of them showing the same amount of unerring concentration on what they were reading. Dean was laying on his stomach on his bed, sighing every once in a while to show his displeasure at having to research through what he thought was some boring material, and Castiel took to the couch, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees as he read over the words on the pages open on the tabletop in front of him, frowning as he concentrated, but he wasn’t finding much of anything.

He turned the page, biting back a sigh, and looked at the large picture shown on one of the pages. His eyes caught sight of what was depicted of an angel pulling someone from the dead, and Castiel’s eyes zeroed in on the way the angel was holding the person’s wrist. He looked down at his covered wrist reflexively, opening his mouth to point out such an unnecessary likeness to everyone.

They got no warning before the sound.

It was the same sound—the one from the Rack, and the one that had shattered glass at the gas station. It suddenly overtook the room, piercing their silence like a horrible scream, and Sam and Bobby both gripped their ears immediately, blindsided. Dean flew off of the bed and landed on the floor, gripping his head the same, and Castiel’s hands found his hair, but the sound wasn’t nearly as bothersome as it had been the first time.

His ears popped, like they got used to the pressure the sound was putting on him, and suddenly it was like he could hear _everything_.

It was like the time in the gas station—where suddenly the sound had changed, and he could hear it, like someone had been talking while he was underwater and he had resurfaced. His hands stayed on his head as the sound flowed over him, around him, _into_ him—it sounded like white noise, but graceful, elegant. He swore it sounded like singing.

And then he heard the same voice again, the same voice that was so obviously inhuman, so obviously speaking in a language that Castiel did not know but could somehow understand, and it whispered his name again, almost like it had the last time, but instead of sounding like a laugh, it sounded like a warning.

“Castiel,” the otherworldly voice said to him, and Castiel felt chills roll up and down his spine. The voice paused, like it was thinking, before it whispered, “Castiel, be _careful_.”

And then it was gone.

It took a long moment for all of the windows to stop shaking—Castiel looked up and noticed that even the mirror hanging on the wall across from him was shaking, that the awkward mirrors on the ceiling were still vibrating. None of the glass had broken this time but the books they had been reading had moved closer to the edge of the surface they had been sitting on, like the sound had the force to quake through the entire room. Castiel slowly took his hands out from over his ears, his breath stuck uncomfortably in his throat, but he couldn’t imagine trying to speak when he had heard the most unusual sound, a sound that almost made him think it was holy, pure. _Angelic_. Castiel looked around at his friends as they silently recovered, dormant volcanoes close to exploding, and he waited with wide eyes to hear what they would ask him, to see if they were just as terrified at hearing that the strange voice knew his name and if they too were wondering what the warning meant.

“What the _fuck_?” Dean shouted, the first of them to react from where he was kneeling by the bed, rubbing his temples, his jaw clenched and his eyes wide. His hands had blood on them—Castiel realized with a flipping stomach that his ears had been bleeding. “ _What the fuck was that_?”

“It feels like my head is going to explode,” Sam groaned, leaning down until his head rested against the wood of the table, the books that had been on the table all having been nudged off by the vibration, the quake. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard that sound in my life.”

“I would prefer to not have to hear that again, honestly,” Bobby mirrored Sam, rubbing his temples. “I was sure for a minute there that my head was going to split like a damn watermelon. That sound—that was fucking horrible.”

“You didn’t—?” Castiel started to ask, confused, and then suddenly shut his mouth, shutting away his entire expression. Looking around at the three, he could tell that they heard something different than he did—he could tell that they didn’t hear the voice, or the chorus of voices that had been her white-noise-like background, and they didn’t hear the warning that had been muttered worriedly, like they were seeing something coming that Castiel couldn’t see. He looked at the three and realized that they had experienced the sound similar to the way he had in Hell, but he had never felt like his head was going to split, explode, like he was about to come apart by hearing it—

Castiel looked around at the ruined room and realized he was the only one who remained completely untouched. Like the sound couldn’t bother him.

He had heard something entirely other than what they had heard.

That was a little more than disconcerting, so he shut his mouth and rubbed his forehead, acting like the sound had killed him, wincing because he didn’t like to lie. He took a deep breath and shook his head, looking back up at them.

“That was the sound,” he announced lamely. “The one from Hell, and the gas station. I think it’s safe to say that’s an angel trying to tell us something.”

 _To be careful_ , he almost just came right out and said, but thought better of it when he saw the look in Dean’s eyes, like he wanted to hunt it but was too afraid of it to move. Dean looked to Bobby, who was looking at Castiel with a furrowed brow, Bobby and the rest of them recovering enough that they were beginning to wonder why the voice was following Castiel in particular.

“Damn, that’s a terrible sound,” Sam groaned. “I can see why you described it as being like a freight train. I felt like my internal organs were about to explode.”

“Angels are becoming a pain in my ass,” Dean grunted. “All of this mystery, and then the goddamn celestial screaming fit—I think I’m starting to get why Ruby was having none of it.”

“It’s following Cas,” Bobby muttered, still staring at him, frowning. “It’s probably the same one that put your soul back into your body and fixed it all up—but why? What’s it trying to do?”

“It sounded pissed,” Dean said.

“It sounded scared,” Castiel replied softly, and then the three were staring at him. Dean’s eyebrows were nearly touching his hairline.

“Alright, Angel Whisperer, I’ll bite,” Dean said. “What the hell does that mean?”

“I don’t know,” Castiel said slowly. “It just sounded different than the other times I heard it. The first time was in Hell, like it was trying to call for me, and then the time at the gas station was more—more of like it was testing me. I don’t know. It sounds crazy.”

“Crazy is something I can handle,” Bobby grunted, reaching into his jacket. “Crazy is easy. I can figure that out.” He pulled out his phone and flipped it open, squinting at the screen. “I think I know someone who might be able to deal out exactly what kind of flavor of supernatural this might be.”

“We should probably get out of this motel room,” Castiel announced, and they all paused in their movements to pick up the books to glance back at him curiously. He fidgeted. “I, ah, kind of have a bad feeling.”

They looked a little skeptical and a little worried—Dean and Sam exchanged a concerned glance like Castiel couldn’t clearly see them, and Bobby paused in the middle of dialing a number, glancing up at him almost nervously. But then Dean nodded and said that they should probably change addresses anyway, because that angel might have broken a few mirrors, and started to pack up, shooting Castiel a curious look he made sure he would be able to see. Castiel simply replied in a thankful expression, gathering everything up quickly as Bobby murmured softly on the phone, not wanting to know what words he was telling about the strange hunter that had been brought back to life by angels. Castiel didn’t want to hear any of it.

He just knew one thing.

_Be careful._

And he wanted to know why.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, everyone!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading this! It really means a lot.
> 
> I'm going to be posting notifications for when I post this story on Tumblr, along with some teasers for this story and stories I'm writing now, so if you wanted to follow me, here's the link:
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> http://shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
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> Thank you all so much for being awesome!
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> x Slang


	6. Do You Know What I'm Seeing?

Bobby called in an old friend of his—a woman named Pamela, a psychic. He said he met her once on a case, said she knew everything about him and his case before he got there, and she helped him bag a couple of uglies. It was enough for Castiel, who just wanted to get the hell out of that town; after the angelic screaming that he heard as a celestial voice speaking calmly, he was a little too paranoid to stay in Pontiac, and the relief didn’t show on his shoulders until they were far outside of the city limits, heading north, and he relaxed against the backseat of the Impala, closing his eyes and listening to the heavy rock music softly playing from the radio, letting the vibrations of the wheels underneath of him on the back-road lanes soothe him. He felt eyes on him every once in a while, as if the Winchesters kept turning around to make sure he was still there, but he didn’t bother opening his eyes.

He hadn’t ever had the time to see the Impala as anything other than a car he had been tagging a ride in for the last several months, but now, reclined and relaxed in the backseat, trying not to smile, he was more comfortable in this machine than he was anywhere else.

He wondered if that was what it meant to have a home, even if it was one on wheels that was constantly playing the best of mullet rock.

He wasn’t so bothered about that.

Dean shook him awake when they reached Pamela’s house outside of Chicago, muttering an apology that probably had to do with having to wake him up, but Castiel just shook his head at him, reaching up and using his fingers as a comb as Bobby’s truck pulled up behind the Impala at the curb and Bobby swung out of it. Bobby led the way up the doorway to Pamela’s house, but they didn’t have to knock before the door swung open, and Pamela was staring straight at Castiel.

“Out of the fire and back into the frying pan, huh?” she asked him with a big grin, her eyebrows hooked upwards humorously. “Makes you a rare individual, Mr. Novak.”

“Nice to meet you, too,” Castiel replied calmly, and she laughed, breaking her gaze from him to look at the rest of the party.

“Bobby!” she cried, jumping forward and grabbing Bobby into a hug, holding him tight as she managed to lift the man off of the ground and swing him around with ease. Castiel and Sam both took an involuntary step back from her, but Dean was just staring at her appreciatively, grinning.

“Guys, this is Pamela Barnes, best psychic in the state,” Bobby introduced them once she had let him back onto the ground, his ears a little red, and Castiel bit back a grin. Pamela’s beauty was something both subtle and blinding, and Castiel had to stop himself more than once from reading the print on her t-shirt for too long.

“Hello,” Dean flirted obviously, smirking, and Sam gave his brother an annoyed look before muttering an awkward _hi_. Castiel was almost too used to Dean’s flings with women who looked like Pamela to be too bothered by the flirting— _almost_. But Pamela just rolled her eyes at Dean with a grin and stepped back from the doorway, ushering them into her home.

Castiel looked around as they entered a home with dark wooden interior, the walls dark shades of red, the lighting minimal, and it was somehow exactly what he expected from the woman he had just met. She led them all into a living room off from the entry, where it was decked out in all sorts of memorabilia and stereotypical elements, like crystal balls and fake skulls. Castiel smirked in amusement as he glanced around, his hands in his pockets. There was a round table in the middle of the room, inevitably where she did her recreational readings, and she leaned her hip against it, crossing her arms over her chest and grinning, eyes mostly for Bobby.

“Find anything?” Bobby asked her immediately, and she shook her head.

“I Ouija’d my way through a dozen spirits,” she explained simply, “but none of them know a thing about what you told me about. None of them had even heard of Castiel or cared.”

“So what’s next on the agenda?”

“A séance, I guess. See if we can contact exactly who did the deed.”

“You’re talking about summoning an angel,” Castiel said in surprise, and Pamela shrugged.

“I’ve summoned a lot of things before,” she told him matter-of-factly. “You’d be surprised with how many creatures show up just when you ask them nicely.”

“I think we should give it a shot,” Dean offered his two cents to the conversation. “Sounds fun.”

Bobby, Sam, and Castiel all shot him an annoyed look.

“Fun,” Bobby said, “until we find out the thing is mad that we made it come out of its heavenly cocoon.”

“It’s the only thing we can do, at this point,” Dean pointed out, throwing his hands up. “Why else would we be here, if we didn’t want to try to communicate and figure out what the hell is up? If no spirits or anything know what’s going on, the thing that raised Cas is _definitely_ going to know.”

“The rest of you worry-warts don’t have to be here for the séance,” Pamela pointed out with a happy hum. “All I need is Castiel over there with that pretty burn on his wrist for a conductor to call it here. The rest of you are spectators.”

Castiel wasn’t even going to ask how she knew the mark was there. He’d met enough psychic children when they were trying to figure out what the hell was up with Sam to know that there had to be normal psychics out there, and, if they had to have one around, Castiel was definitely alright with it being Pamela Barnes.

“I’m game,” Castiel said.

Pamela clapped her hands and skipped across the room to grab a folded tablecloth from a low shelf, and the four men stared with no qualms as her tight Metallica top rode up her back to expose a tramp stamp at her lower back, reading _Jesse Forever_. Castiel saw the impish grin on Dean’s face out of the corner of his eye and just knew he was going to say something about it, and Castiel almost wanted to sigh.

“Who’s Jesse?” Dean asked before any of them could stop him, and a defeated look crossed Sam’s face for a split second, almost making Castiel laugh. Pamela straightened up and grinned at him, her eyes sparkling mischievously.

“He wasn’t forever,” she purred, smirking. Dean grinned back.

“His loss.”

“Might be your gain,” she cooed as she passed by him and, the second she was out of hearing range, putting the tablecloth over the table with Bobby, Dean leaned over and nudged Sam, probably not even realizing that Castiel was literally standing right beside them.

“Dude,” Dean muttered to his brother, “I am so in.”

A look of sudden disappointment and anger washed over Sam’s face before he composed himself, laughing once mirthlessly. “Yeah, Dean, I don’t know, man—she’ll eat you alive.”

“Bring it,” Dean laughed.

“You’re invited, too, grumpy,” Pamela called to Sam without having to turn around. Dean scowled, turning and pointing at his brother.

“You are _not_ invited,” Dean growled.

In a normal situation, before Lilith and the Rack, Castiel would have laughed. He would have _tried_ to think it was funny. But, now, after he knew Dean knew, after he thought Dean cared a little about that, all he felt was an extreme sickness in every cell of his body. He knew Dean probably didn’t like dudes, and he was being really kind to welcome Castiel so warmly back into his life after hearing that the sap was in love with him, but Castiel had forgotten the lingering sting of it—the way he had to watch Dean disappear whole nights with women, the way he had to watch Dean watch them as they passed by as his face lit up with interest. Castiel had forgotten that feeling of rejection, even if he shouldn’t feel rejected, but it was spiraling back at him with fervor because of everything Dean now knew about him.

Castiel ghosted away from the brothers, pretending like he hadn’t heard their exchange, helping Pamela set up. But, when Castiel glanced back when he was placing the last candle on the tabletop, Sam casted him a sad look. Castiel looked away from him like the gaze had burned into his skin.

Pamela directed them all to take a seat, and Castiel lowered himself down next to her, Dean dropping casually into the seat next to Castiel without a word spoken. Sam sat on Dean’s other side, and Bobby took the last place in between Sam and Pamela, not looking pleased but not outright objecting either. Pamela leaned forward in her seat, her eyes alive as she grinned around at them.

“Okay, now, take each other’s hands,” she told them, and they did as she told, Castiel pausing only for a millisecond before slipping his hand awkwardly into Dean’s. Dean’s hands were warm—Dean muttered under his breath that Castiel’s were ice, making a face—and Castiel was just happy his palms weren’t sweating. Pamela took Bobby’s hand and looked to Castiel. “I’ll have to touch something that our monster touched.”

Suddenly, under the table, her hand grabbed Castiel’s upper thigh. Castiel let out a laugh.

“Pretty sure that’s sexual assault, Pamela,” Castiel teased, rolling his eyes. “You know damn well where she touched.”

Pamela laughed, winking before giving his thigh one last squeeze and letting go, reaching out and sliding her hand under Castiel’s shirt sleeve and touching the burn mark, which still hurt but only slightly.

“You’re like ice,” she muttered, making a face just like Dean’s.

“Seriously, dude, you have terrible circulation,” Dean replied, grinning when Castiel shot him an annoyed look. Pamela laughed before shaking her head, calling attention back to her.

“Okay,” she said. “Close your eyes.”

Sam sent Castiel an encouraging look, always the one who looked out for him emotionally, before Sam closed his eyes and leaned forward in his chair nervously. Castiel glanced around the table one more time, hesitating on Dean’s face, before he took a deep breath and closed his eyes as well. He nearly jumped out of his chair when Dean gave Castiel’s hand a reassuring squeeze, feeling his face heat up in embarrassment. He was suddenly thankful no one could see him.

Pamela’s voice began to chant loudly, confidently, almost commandingly, “I invoke, conjure, and command you appear unto me before this circle”, repeating the phrase several more times before she stopped for a beat, and Castiel kept his eyes closed but he was sure she was grinning. “I command you to show your face. _Anna_.”

“Anna?” Dean muttered flatly. “Not a very intimidating name.”

“It’s a very holy name, Dean,” Sam muttered back to him impatiently. “ _Shh_.”

“I _command_ you to _show me your face_!” Pamela suddenly boomed, causing them all to jump. She paused before her hand fell off of Castiel’s wrist, a feeling of static cling crawling onto his neck as she let him go, and he opened his eyes, letting Dean’s hand go as he looked at her. The rest of them came back to Earth and watched as she frowned, looking around the room.

“What gives?” Dean demanded. “Why’d you stop?”

“Could have sworn I got it,” Pamela muttered, still frowning. “Huh.”

The static on the back of Castiel’s neck was unbearable. He reached up and rubbed his neck impatiently before giving into his newfound paranoia and glancing over his shoulder. And then he yelled loudly, jumping to his feet, nearly knocking over his chair as he braced himself against the table, his eyes wide.

“Cas?” Dean demanded, sounding freaked, looking in confusion where Castiel was suddenly staring, panicked. “Cas, what’s wrong?”

The woman from the Rack was standing before Castiel with an amused smile, looking around at the rest of the table. She took her time before raising her eyes to Castiel’s, a patient smile on her face, and said in that same pleasant voice that he remembered, “Hello, Castiel.”

Pamela gasped loudly, her head snapping to the woman’s general vicinity. Castiel just stared at her, ignoring the questions the other three were asking to his back. Castiel let his grip on the table go slowly, straightening up. The woman smiled at him as he watched her, trying to think of something to say.

She was the same as his dim recollections from the Rack. She had medium length red hair and brown eyes, several inches shorter than him, her body build slim and seemingly fragile. She was wearing the same loose white button-up and slacks. Castiel stared at her for a moment, entirely speechless, and then he found words.

“Be careful of what?” he asked her slowly, and she threw her head back and laughed, a loud, tinkling sound, like a wind chime on a breezy day. Castiel caught Pamela flinch out of the corner of his eye.

“I knew you could hear me,” she thrilled, grinning at him. “I kept testing you, but you gave no reply. But I was so _sure_.”

“So that was your voice I’ve been hearing?” Castiel demanded. “You should probably turn down the frequency.”

“That is the voice of my true form,” she explained softly, civilly. “Only a handful of humans possess the ability to be able to hear it. I figured that, what with you being special and all, that you would be able to understand me. And I was right.”

“Who are you?” Castiel demanded, and she rolled her eyes.

“I was sure your priority would be asking me why I saved you,” she shared with him.

“Yeah, well, that’s coming soon enough.”

“My name is Anna,” she told him, standing straighter, “and I’m an Angel of the Lord. I’m the one that gripped your firm ass tight and raised you from perdition.”

Castiel almost laughed but managed to control himself, all at once amused and a little surprised to hear those words coming out of an angel’s mouth. “Well, yeah, I’ve gathered that much.”

“You want to know who I am, to have been able to get into Hell and save you?” she asked, tilting her head inquiringly to the side. “Curious. I am a soldier, Castiel. My orders were to save you.”

“Why me?” he demanded what he wanted to know most of all. “Of all the people there that you could have saved, why did you choose me?”

“Like I said,” Anna said, “you are special.”

“Special,” he hissed, shaking his head. “What does that _mean_?”

“It means,” she said softly, taking a step forward, a tremor of laughter under her tone, “that you are standing in a room with four other people, but you are the only one who can see me. It means that you do not even realize that I am speaking in an entirely different language, one that you have never heard, but you can understand and answer me in the same ancient, holy language.”

Castiel paused before he demanded, “ _Excuse me_?”

Anna laughed again, amused at his horror. Castiel spun around violently, turning his back to Anna to look at the four people still seated around the table—four people staring at him in absolute horror.

“You mean to tell me,” Castiel said, suddenly and sickly aware that he was speaking English for the first time in the last handful of minutes, “that you can’t _see_ her?”

Castiel blindly pointed at Anna. Their eyes snapped to the spot where she stood, smiling, but they didn’t see anything, because they stared back at him, looking cautious. Castiel looked at all of them, his mouth hanging open.

“Have I been speaking English?” he demanded, and they grimaced at each other. Terror began flooding through his veins.

He turned back to Anna, who was looking at him with pity now.

“What did you do to me?” he demanded frantically. “What have you done?”

“Nothing, Castiel,” she whispered. “This is the way you have always been. _Special._ ”

Castiel turned back to Pamela. “You can hear her,” he stated pleadingly, pleading with her with his eyes to tell him he wasn’t losing his mind. “You looked at her when you heard her speak.”

“Castiel,” Pamela said slowly, her eyes still on Anna’s general direction. “I can hear her, but . . . I can’t understand her. She’s not . . .”

“Not speaking English,” Castiel finished for her, his voice oddly hollow, and he rounded back on Anna, knowing his eyes were flashing in anger. “Stop this. Show yourself to them, and stop speaking in this made-up language.”

“You’re the only one I wish to speak directly to,” she informed him.

“I don’t give a rat’s ass!” he told her angrily. “Show yourself!”

She gave him a flat look but sighed delicately. “Your wish is my command,” she told him sourly, giving him a look.

Castiel could tell the moment she flickered into existence because Dean jumped from his spot beside Castiel, hissing a surprised breath through his teeth like he had been expecting Castiel to be hallucinating. It wasn’t the first of Dean’s personal betrayals for the day, and this one stung just the same.

Anna crossed her arms, glancing around at everyone, and Castiel recognized English when she carefully said, “This isn’t a conversation meant for their ears, Castiel.”

“Too bad,” he growled. “Back in the motel room, you told me to be careful. You haven’t told me why.”

“I did,” she argued, annoyed. “You are special, Castiel, as you must have realized by now. There are many people who would use and abuse the gifts you have, and they would love to manipulate you. They would also like to kill you, because nothing good can come out of a man who crawled from the earth.”

“What importance could I have to Heaven?” Castiel demanded. “What does it matter, if I can hear you?”

“You are the most important to Heaven,” she told him patiently, insistently. She suddenly tilted her head. “You told me that you wanted to be saved. I saw what you were thinking of before I appeared and—”

She paused, still looking at Castiel, and then suddenly frowned.

“You don’t think you _deserve_ to be saved,” she observed, realization flooding over her face, followed closely with pity and sadness. “ _Oh, Castiel_.”

Castiel flinched away as she took a step forward, and Dean tensed. But Anna just reached out a hand, as if she was going to touch him, but then thought better of it and dropped it back to her side, her head still tilted with that same damn expression.

“Good things do happen, Castiel,” she whispered.

“Not in my experience.” He looked her right in the eye. “So why did you do it?”

She took a step back, looking into his eyes right back, before she announced confidently, “Because God commanded it. Because we have work for you.”

There was a long, sudden, stunned silence. And then Dean shifted, and Castiel knew what was coming before it happened.

“How are we supposed to know that you are actually an angel?” Dean demanded, his eyes narrowing. “Are we just supposed to believe all of this holy shit because you swear it to be so?”

“Dean Winchester,” Anna said, and then laughed pleasantly, looking at him and smiling fondly. “This is your problem, Dean. You have no faith.”

Suddenly, the flames on the candles grew, adding much more light to the room, and Castiel’s breath caught in his throat as he spotted the walls behind Anna as she flexed her shoulders—walls filled with a shadow of dark angel wings. Dean gaped at her, his face paling, and the candles’ glow went back down to where it had been the entire time. She breathed out, looking around at all of them, before her gaze stopped on Castiel.

“This will not be the last you see of me, Castiel,” Anna told him, her hands clasping before her, as if she was praying. “We have much more to discuss.”

And then she was gone.

“Oh my god,” Pamela muttered before reaching her hands up to cover her mouth. Sam stared at Castiel with wide, amazed eyes, while Bobby just looked at him like he had grown an extra head in the last twenty minutes. Dean was still looking at the spot where Anna had just been, looking at the wall where they had seen an impossible pair of wings. Castiel felt like he was about to pass out, or at least throw up.

But he did neither. He sunk weakly into the chair he had just vacated, his head falling into his hands as he tried to breathe through what would inevitably become a much bigger panic attack later, when he had more time to think about it.

“This is impossible,” Castiel announced, laughing weakly. “I just spoke to an angel, in Enochian. _Enochian_. I don’t even know _Spanish_.”

“And three days ago,” Pamela said slowly, “you were in Hell. You’re going to have to face that your life isn’t the same as it was before your tour downstairs, Castiel.”

Castiel took a deep breath.

“Dude,” Dean murmured, looking over at Castiel with wide eyes. “That bitchy angel airlifted your ass out of the hot box.”

“I know,” Castiel said, sighing. “She even said it was firm.”

Dean choked on his own spit, and Sam burst out laughing so loud it almost hurt his ears. It took Castiel a moment before he started laughing as well, Bobby and Pamela humoring their hysteria when Dean’s laugh started as well, his eyes brightening as he grinned over at Castiel. Castiel grinned at him back, feeling like he was truly laughing for the first time in years, and Castiel heard Pamela sigh under her breath as Castiel’s eyes locked with Dean’s.

“Damn,” she whispered just loud enough for Castiel to hear, a little amused. “And I thought I had a chance with him.”

Her words weren’t enough to stop his laughter, but they were definitely enough that he thought about them for a long time later, when they were back in the car heading to South Dakota, his mind spinning around a thought that was impossible, completely illogical.

But, still, Castiel let himself laugh freely in those moments the same way he allowed himself to hope freely in the car later that day, thinking about the way Dean had smiled at him, his eyes shining when he looked at him, and he hoped to a God that might actually be there that it was true.


	7. Bright Eyes

“Those wings can’t have been real,” Dean decided resolutely. Castiel sighed where he was sprawled on Bobby’s couch and turned his head to watch Dean pace back and forth on the other side of the room, practically watching the man have a nervous breakdown as he tried again and again to deny the existence of something they had just seen right before their very eyes. “Like, angels were reasonable in theory, but that Anna chick—she didn’t seem like an angel.”

“How would we know?” Castiel mumbled. “It’s not like we’ve ever been around an angel before.”

Dean sent Castiel a dirty look. “You’re just up and believing this?”

“ _I_ just spoke in a language I never learned to someone that only _I_ could see,” Castiel deadpanned, looking up at the ceiling. “I think I’m more willing to believe the unbelievable than you are right now.”

“Okay, I can’t explain that,” Dean admitted, slumping down into a chair across the coffee table from Castiel. “I’m just having a hard time believing that there’s such thing as angels when no hunter has ever seen one before.”

“Newsflash, Dean,” Castiel muttered, “but _we_ just did.”

“Aren’t you a ray of sunshine on a cloudy day,” Dean huffed, kicking his feet up onto the coffee table. “But I just—if she really is an angel, and if what’s really happening here is God asking you for help or whatever—where were they? There are monsters crawling all over the globe, but the angels have just been sitting back and letting people get possessed and murdered every day?”

“I suppose it’s the natural order of things.”

“There’s nothing natural about dying to something demonic.”

“I _have_ died to something demonic,” Castiel pointed out, looking over at Dean, “and I can say that I’m sure people who have been killed by human serial killers probably had worst last minutes than I did.” Castiel pushed himself up into a sitting position, leaning toward Dean in an identical position as to how Dean was leaning toward him. “Look, Dean—I’m having as much of a hard time wrapping my head around this as you are. I hate getting singled out at birthday parties, and now I’m getting singled out by _God_? Of all the people on the surface that Heaven might want on their side, they wanted _me_? I don’t understand what’s going on here more than anyone else who saw what we saw—but you were there just an hour ago when Bobby found in not just one but _three_ of his angel books that they have the power to pull a soul out of the Pit. Sometimes it’s less about faith and more about fact, Dean.”

Dean looked at Castiel, not saying anything. Castiel held his gaze.

“I know you’re not choirboy about all of this, Dean, but you have to look at proof when you have it. And there’s proof that I can’t explain. There’s something we haven’t seen anything like before telling me that _God_ has a personal interest in me, and we _have_ to run with that, no matter how much I don’t understand why He would give a damn about me. Because sure, I’ve saved people, but I’ve stolen and I’ve sinned more than most people on this planet in their lifetime—I’m not special, just a regular guy.”

“You might be a regular guy, Cas,” Dean muttered, “but you’re obviously important to the man upstairs—if He’s real—if He went and sent angels down to drag your ass from the Pit. And I think it’s safe to say that makes you pretty damn special.”

“I just don’t know why someone like me would be special.”

Dean suddenly got up, looking annoyed. “There we go again, with that _‘someone like me’_ shit.” Dean threw his arms out. “I don’t know what that means, Cas. Someone who is naturally kind to people? Someone who will do anything for someone, even if they don’t deserve it? Someone who would save someone even if it means damning himself for the rest of eternity?”

Castiel’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t look away from Dean’s eyes as he stared him down, Dean daring him silently to argue with him. Castiel took a deep breath in an attempt to slow down his rapidly beating heart, trying to read every single emotion in Dean’s eyes.

Dean looked away, reaching up to rub at his face. Castiel watched him rock back onto his heels for a moment before he turned back to Castiel, his eyes burning bright as he softly demanded, his voice like gravel and lace, “Are we going to talk about what Lilith said that night?”

And there it was.

Castiel had been expecting it—this was the first time the two of them had been properly alone since Castiel had been back; Sam and Bobby had taken a run to pick up some books, food, and summoning supplies that stretched a couple of towns over, and Castiel had been much too aware of their absence. He had a feeling that this would be when Dean would bring it up, when no one would overhear them, but even so, the moment Castiel heard him say the words he had at once been hoping for and dreading, he flinched.

Castiel straightened up a bit, his eyes on Dean like he was waiting for him to start yelling. Castiel cleared his throat. “I figured it was pretty self-explanatory,” Castiel stated cautiously.

“Why didn’t you just _tell_ me?” Dean muttered softly, lowering himself back down into the chair, his hands gripping the edges tightly. Castiel felt like he was about to go into cardiac arrest, his heart was beating so fast. He didn’t want to look at Dean, didn’t want to see anything that might show on his face that would break him, but he couldn’t look away.

“It’s not exactly an easy thing to say,” Castiel replied, laughing humorlessly. “It’s not really something that comes up in casual conversation.”

“Then why didn’t you say it after the deal?” Dean demanded, sounding destroyed and angry and upset all at once, and Castiel was thoroughly taken aback by the emotions on his face, of Dean being desperate. “Why didn’t you say something during your year?”

“That would have been the worst time to have said it, Dean,” Castiel whispered softly, wincing when he imagined rejection, when he imagined what his last year would have been like without the Winchesters. Dean stared at Castiel, his eyebrows pulling together quizzically.

“But she was telling the truth, right?” Dean asked delicately. “Lilith. When she said . . .”

Castiel thought he was going to die of mortification when he slowly nodded.

Dean let out a long breath, leaning back in his chair slightly. He ran a hand nervously through his hair before leaning forward again, restless, his fingers twitching and giving away his anxiety. Castiel wanted to be anywhere but here, unable to look at the expression on Dean’s face, looking _through_ him, not wanting to see pity and rejection.

When Dean spoke in a soft voice, it slammed into Castiel harder than a freight train.

“I thought I was going to die when I lost Sam,” Dean whispered softly, his voice rough, his eyes on his hands curled together on his lap. “I just—I took care of him all the time, and he was always my baby brother, always a part of my life, probably the _biggest_ part of my life. I remember—I remember being in that town, after Sam had died, and how you came and tried to snap me out of it. I didn’t realize until you were gone that I never asked what happened to your face.”

“I caught the Jake kid,” Castiel informed Dean softly, almost mechanically. “I got a few hits in, but he had that whole strength thing, and one punch from him knocked me out cold. Bobby said I flew a couple of feet.”

“I couldn’t believe I hadn’t asked you something so small, afterward,” Dean told him, shaking his head. “But—with Sam. When he was dead, and you were there, and I . . . I thought I was dying. I thought there was no way I could possibly keep moving, not without Sam. You and Bobby kept trying to snap me out of it, to get me to talk about it, but I kept pushing you both away and . . . I knew that I would have to let go. I thought about having to let go of Sam and I knew it was impossible and I knew I couldn’t do it and I almost broke. And then you would talk to me, just talk to me, like you were talking me off the edge of a bridge, and I guess you were, really. You would just tell me it would be alright, that I would get better, that Sam wouldn’t have wanted me—that he wouldn’t want me to give up. I tried so hard to listen to you. I remember when I kicked Bobby out, how you stayed. I was almost relieved that you had, thinking that maybe you were going to be able to talk me into being human again—and then you left. I heard you _leave_. I thought I was going to be alone forever.”

Dean shook his head, a mirthless smile on his face. Castiel watched him, helpless, silent, his eyes wide. Dean’s eyes were devastated but his expression was determined, like he needed to get through the next few words or else he would never be able to forgive himself. So he kept talking.

“I was sitting there by myself, talking to my dead brother like that would be enough to bring him back, when he suddenly started breathing again. Sam _woke up_ , and he started freaking out, and I thought I was dead or dreaming or something. I looked at Sam’s back and saw the wound was gone, and I made up some lie about how you had fixed him up, and I—I knew it was real. And then I realized that Sam had been dead _two days_ —that he wouldn’t have just popped back up and been magically healed again. And then I remembered that you had left, and I knew where you must have gone, and I was _so fucking mad_ , Cas. I could have killed you. I considered just shooting you when you walked through the door, I was so mad. I knew I wouldn’t, but damn did I want to.

“And then in you walked. I wanted to punch you, Cas. I wanted to do it. And then I realized that . . . I actually didn’t, really. I was mad, but I was mostly . . . sad. I was devastated. I couldn’t understand _why_ you would do it.

“And then you said that you did it because Sam was more important. Because you couldn’t be more important than him. And you had one year left and I just—I was so _mad_ at you. I don’t even have words for it. I hated you so _much_. I wasted so much of that year being mad at you for something I couldn’t control, when I should have spent it—when I should have realized that you would be having a hard time, too. You were always such a people-pleaser, Cas—you always do what is selfless so that other people can be happy, and I thought that you were doing this because you thought that it would make me happy. But it just made us all fucking miserable. It was almost worse than losing Sam, like I was slowly being ripped out of my skin. I knew that we had made you make this deal, if not personally but because you felt obligated to, and I knew your death would be on our hands. I couldn’t face that. I could barely even look at myself in the fucking _mirror_ I hated myself so much.

“I wasted that year. I should have been trying to see if you were alright, trying to see if I could save you. But I didn’t do enough of either until it was too late. And then you were gone.

“God, Cas, I just—when we were in that house in Indiana, when we were with Lilith—I knew we were too late, and I knew we weren’t going to be able to stop it. But I was going to fucking _die_ trying to save you. I already knew that. And then, when Lilith—when she went to do that weird light thing, when you stepped in front of me—I just—fuck—and when she said—I didn’t—and then the hellhounds—”

Dean broke off for a moment, his hands clenching and unclenching in his lap, before he started breathing again.

“I thought about it, all the time. I thought about how the hellhounds had tackled you, could see it every time I closed my eyes how they started clawing at you and I could see them opening your skin and I could hear you screaming in my head and I remember seeing this, wanting to help, but I hadn’t gotten there in time. Lilith had turned on Sam and then nothing had happened, and then she took off, and I dove at you but—you were—I think you were still _breathing_ and— _fuck_ , Cas, there was blood _everywhere_. You were ripped to _shreds_. _And you were still breathing_.

“And then you weren’t.

“I guess my shield for people I care about dying is to deny it completely because we drove two hundred miles to Pontiac before Sam managed to convince me to pull over, told me that we had to bury you. I think I blocked out most of it, to be honest. I don’t remember much. Sam made a cross and a coffin and I dug until my arms were numb. I watched you die and then I _buried_ you, and . . . It was hard to believe that my best friend was dead. It was the worst feeling in the entire world.

“And . . . Look, Cas, I’m not that good with expressing myself,” Dean told him directly, his eyes finally flickering up to look at him. “I don’t—I can’t—I’m shit at—”

Dean made an irritated sound, reaching up and rubbing at his face. And then he suddenly got to his feet again, started pacing, and Castiel stayed silent and watched him, frozen, like making a sudden movement might spook Dean and he would never be able to hear it all, and he would always be stuck on this horrible cliffhanger that made _hope_ gather in his stomach for the first time in a long time.

Dean said, “Sam tried to tell me that—he tried to say that he thought that you—but I was so convinced, like a goddamn idiot—”

Dean covered his mouth for a minute before uncovering it again.

“I am shit at emotions,” Dean announced. “I wish I wasn’t, because I want to know what to say when I say—I didn’t feel human, didn’t feel _alive_ , until you were back. I was there, but I wasn’t, and now you’re back. And I—”

Dean moved so abruptly that Castiel shot to his feet, disturbed by his sudden movement. But Dean only crossed the room to rifle through his bag, pulling something out and holding it to his chest before taking the steps across the room until he was standing so close that Castiel could see the different flecks of colors in his eyes. Dean shoved the object out and Castiel reached out and took it automatically, his hands curving around the cold, familiar fabric.

“I’m no good with words,” Dean whispered, his voice choked up, his eyes on the object Castiel was holding to his chest. “I just want you to know that, if you don’t feel the same way as you did before Hell, after everything that happened to you, I understand, and I will always be here if you need me until you ask me not to be, and I just wanted you to know that.”

Dean took a sudden, sharp step backward. Feeling confused, almost dumbstruck, Castiel looked down at what he was holding.

It was his trench coat _. Castiel’s_ trench coat, the one he used to wear almost every day, the only piece of clothing he had always had through his life, since he was young. It was _his_ trench coat and Dean had kept it in his bag and it smelled like Dean and not like his clothes but _Dean_ , the way Dean’s hair smelled, and Castiel couldn’t breathe because Dean had been keeping his trench coat close to him, kept it safe even when he thought Castiel would never be coming back, and Castiel tightened his hold on it. He looked up at Dean with wide eyes.

Dean swallowed hard before looking down at his feet, avoiding Castiel’s gaze, shifting awkwardly on his feet. Castiel stared at him, feeling like he had been punched in the stomach, and he whispered, “Dean?”

“Sorry,” Dean said, wincing, flinching back like Castiel was going to try to hit him. “I just—I’m really bad at this and I—”

The trench coat slipped through Castiel’s hands, landing in a ball on the floor as Castiel surged forward, reaching out with both hands and holding Dean’s shoulders softly, almost afraid to touch him, looking into his eyes in surprise. Dean looked up at Castiel, his eyes nervous but wide and honest, and Castiel’s heart sped up when he saw the hope reflected back at him. Castiel hesitated only a second.

And then he kissed him.

For a second, Dean was frozen, and the only thought that went through Castiel’s head was a mixture of how soft and warm Dean’s lips were and how Castiel must have made a terrible judgment error because Dean wasn’t moving, he was frozen, this wasn’t what he wanted. And then, right when Castiel was about to pull away, Dean suddenly started moving. Dean leaned into Castiel, grabbing fistfuls of his shirt and tugging him closer, and Castiel stumbled forward until he could feel Dean’s body heat and he felt his skin getting hotter, his face flushing in a mixture of embarrassment and pleasure. Dean’s lips were moving on his and the only thought that Castiel could think was his name, just a constant mantra of _Dean Dean Dean Dean Dean_ and his hands were on Castiel’s hips and Castiel’s hands were curling around his neck and he needed to breathe but he didn’t know how. How long had he wondered what it would be like, to have Dean’s hands on him, to have his lips against his? How long did Castiel dream for what he thought was impossible, only to be living it now?

Dean was right—they had really wasted the last year of Castiel’s life.

But he was back now. Castiel was alive and Dean was here and he cared about him and it was impossible but it was _happening_ , and he wasn’t about to let it slip out of his grasp. He wanted to focus on it, to breathe it in, because he didn’t know how long this was going to last.

Dean’s lips were warm and soft as he gently kissed Castiel like he was going to break, and Castiel leaned deeper into it, taking a risk as he captured Dean’s lower lip in his teeth.

Dean groaned and pulled him closer, and suddenly their innocent, chaste kiss became mad and desperate.

Castiel slipped his hands into Dean’s hair, pressing forward until their bodies were flush against each other, and Dean made a sound in the back of his throat that made Castiel’s pulse spike. Everywhere was Dean, every _thing_ was Dean, and it was making Castiel’s head spin with all of the emotions he once used to have to repress, used to have to deny. He was so close to Dean and Dean’s hands were curling in his hair and Dean’s smell was intoxicating. Dean murmured Castiel’s name against his mouth, and Castiel felt like he was going to stop breathing, happiness like nothing he had ever known before pressing against his chest, and he was sure he would die right there in Dean’s arms and he didn’t think it was a bad way to go.

Dean pulled his face away from Castiel’s an inch and Castiel rolled his weight to his toes, pursuing him. Castiel felt Dean’s laugh in the rumble of his chest as he allowed one quick kiss, nothing more than a peck, before he pulled away again, grinning when Castiel frowned. Dean squeezed the hands still on Castiel’s hips, his thumbs rubbing soothingly in circles.

“Down, boy,” Dean teased, smirking. “We have to stop.”

“Why?” Castiel asked, practically whining. Dean’s smirk turned into a smile as he looked into Castiel’s eyes, his entire face softening. Castiel had never seen this side of Dean before, the side that was looking at him so _gently_ , and he wanted to see more of it. He leaned in closer, just slightly, but Dean was not even a little bit distracted.

“Because,” Dean murmured into the minimal air between their lips, “if we don’t stop now, then we won’t be able to stop.”

“And?”

“You’re really impatient, Cas,” Dean laughed. “You know what I’m trying to say.”

Castiel let out a deep sigh before taking a step away, frowning when the chilled air touched the parts of his body that used to be pressed against Dean’s. “I know,” Castiel replied, rolling his eyes.

Dean smiled, taking a step forward and forcing Castiel to take one back, and they followed this routine until Dean forced Castiel to lower himself back down onto the couch, Dean flopping down next to him a respectable distance away, but his knee immediately moved to press against Castiel’s. Dean leaned back into the sofa, grinning over at Castiel. “For once, I don’t think we actually have to rush this, Cas. Take a breather, why don’t you?”

Castiel shot him a dark look, but the effect was immediately broken when he grinned, happier than he wanted to admit out loud, his chest warm and it felt like there were fireworks going off under his skin. He felt like he was caged energy, and he was ready to burst with it.

Castiel couldn’t take his eyes away from Dean’s. It felt like a lifetime since he had seen them, and he was afraid of looking away, afraid of missing a single emotion. He smiled and he watched as Dean smiled back, mirrored happiness in his eyes.

It was too good to be true, but it was the truth. It was astounding.

“What did you mean earlier?” Castiel asked, his hand twining against Dean’s, their fingers tangling together on the couch between them. “You said something about how Sam tried to convince you—of me?”

Dean’s expression became uncomfortable for a moment before he took a breath. “Yeah, kind of. I guess I—I always had an eye for you, from a distance. After the demon deal, I—one night I exploded a bit on Sam and told him everything, and Sam got all mad at me and told me I was an idiot, and that you obviously liked me so I should do something about it. But I didn’t believe him, and I was still really mad at you for no reason, so I didn’t do anything. Now I’m kind of mad I didn’t.”

“I’m back,” Castiel reminded him. “You don’t have regret anything if I’m right here.”

Dean smiled a bit, looking down at their fingers.

“Why were you so mad at me, anyway?” Castiel asked, angling his body toward Dean’s. “I mean, I kind of understood, but I feel like I don’t know the whole story.”

Castiel watched, stunned, as Dean Winchester did something he never expected.

He blushed.

“I, uh, had a bit of a crush on you, I guess,” Dean said, smiling a small smile of embarrassment. “When you sold your soul for Sam, I, uh—you were always more likely to side with Sam on things and all so—when that happened, I thought you . . . I thought you liked Sam, and not me, in that way, and I was upset. I honestly didn’t even _realize_ that you were interested in me until Lilith, and then—then it was too late to say anything.”

Castiel blinked slowly.

“ _Sam_?” he demanded.

Dean fidgeted, his ears burning red. “It made a lot of sense at the time,” Dean muttered.

“ _Sam_?” Castiel demanded again, incredulously, before he shook his head. “Dean, jeez, your brother is great and all, but no. He’s . . . No. It was never Sam.”

“Good,” Dean said awkwardly, clearing his throat. “That’s what Sam said, too, but I didn’t believe him. So, really, I’m just a complete idiot.”

“Only a little,” Castiel assured him, and Dean scowled at him playfully. Castiel grinned.

Dean cleared his throat, throwing his free hand up. “So,” he stated loudly, glancing around. “Now what?”

Castiel smiled innocently.

When Bobby and Sam walked through the door about twenty minutes later, they found Castiel and Dean still on the couch. Castiel was stretched forward, his feet resting crossed at the ankle on the coffee table filled with old car magazines, and Dean was a Bible’s distance away, frowning down at the research book Castiel was forcing him to read. Castiel was flipping the pages of his book casually, his eyes slipping over the text, his fingers tracing the symbols painted onto the opposite page. He mumbled a greeting to Bobby and Sam when they said their hellos, announcing they had food, but Castiel didn’t even hear them. Dean got up to go retrieve his food eagerly but Castiel stayed behind, rubbing his temple.

His fingers started tracing a symbol—he froze.

He’d seen this one before.

“This looks familiar,” Castiel announced vacantly to the three in the kitchen, who glanced over at him. Castiel straightened up and turned the book around so that they could see it, pointing at the symbol. “Bobby, didn’t you say you were looking for this one?”

“A hunter friend of mine asked me to look for it, yeah,” Bobby said, surprised, “but I got a little too swamped with you three. What is it?”

“The Mark of the Witnesses,” Castiel read from the book, looking up at Bobby. “It’s from an ancient prophecy, of the rising of the witnesses.”

Castiel gave Bobby a meaningful look, knowing that he would be the only other one to understand. Bobby set down the burger that was in his hand, turning pale. “You’re joking.”

“There’s a spell in here,” Castiel said, standing. “You’re going to have to call this hunter—these ghosts aren’t going to be pretty. All of them died unnaturally, and they’re going to go after the reason why they died—which might be why you mentioned one of the hunters was found minced in his house. These ghosts are angry, rabid, and restless.”

“And not supposed to be here,” Bobby said, frowning as he rushed to the phone, dialing quickly. “Hand me the spell.”

Castiel did so dutifully. Bobby looked down at it, blinking.

“Boy, I can’t translate that kind of old Latin off the top of my head,” Bobby pointed out impatiently. Castiel stared at him, shocked, before looking back to the book.

“It’s not in Latin,” Castiel said slowly, confused. “It’s in English.”

The whole room was silent. Castiel glanced over to the kitchen to find that the brothers had frozen as well, looking at him with wide eyes. He looked back at Bobby who was still holding the phone to his ear, staring at Castiel with that same worried look.

“Cas,” Bobby said slowly, “look again.”

So he did.

“This can’t be happening to me,” Castiel muttered, blinking and watching the text shift from English to Latin, and then back again, all of which he could decipher in his mind. He looked up at Bobby with wide eyes, opening his mouth to ask, but Bobby shook his head at him, acknowledging the hunter on the other end of the line. Bobby poked at the spell, telling her that he was going to hand it over to someone who could read it, and Castiel took the phone, frozenly reading what was on the paper to the woman, feeling sick.

The hunter on the other line thanked Castiel and hung up. Castiel hung up as well, setting the phone down on the table, still clutching the book in his hand. He turned his head and looked at Bobby and the Winchesters, Bobby a few feet to his right and the Winchesters hovering in the doorway to the kitchen anxiously, exchanging worried glances.

“Bobby,” Castiel murmured hoarsely, “this isn’t good.”

“I know, boy,” Bobby said, breathing out. “The rising of the witnesses—it’s not possible.”

“Only on one occasion,” Castiel pointed out, and Bobby made a face, nervously adjusting his hat as he looked to the windows, like the answer was just out of sight. Castiel glanced at the Winchesters, his eyes hesitating on Dean.

“What is going on?” Sam finally demanded, stepping one step forward. “What are you guys talking about, the rising of the witnesses? What does that mean?”

Castiel and Bobby exchanged a look, and Castiel took the hint.

“It’s from an old prophecy,” Castiel explained slowly. “The rising of the witnesses isn’t really the part that’s the most concerning.”

“Cas,” Dean whispered, his eyes tight. He pointed to the book. “What book are you getting this prophecy from?”

Castiel slowly held it up, letting them read the cover as he announced, “It’s from a lengthy version of Revelations. The rising of the witnesses—it’s nothing more than a mile marker. It’s a sign.”

“A sign of what?” Sam and Dean demanded simultaneously, their tones equally as cautious.

Castiel said, “The apocalypse.”

Sam gaped at him, and Dean choked on air.

“Apocalypse? _The_ apocalypse?” Dean demanded incredulously. “Four horseman, pestilence, five-dollars-a-gallon-gas _apocalypse_?”

“I think we now know,” Castiel said slowly, unevenly, “why the angels might have wanted me back in the game.”

Sam rubbed his face. “What do we do now?”

“Road trip,” Dean answered shakily. “Grand Canyon, Star Trek Experience. Bunny Ranch.”

“It’s all written,” Castiel said exhaustedly, glancing over helplessly to Bobby, but he was still silent. “There isn’t much we can do at this point to stop it, not that we know of, at least. The only chance we might have is with my newfound angel best friend.”

“So, what?” Dean demanded. “Trap her, try to get her to spill the beans?”

“It’s worth a shot.” Castiel set down the large book of apocalyptic predictions, his shaking hands unable to hold it up any longer. “She’s the only one that might know what the hell is going on around here.”

“Alright,” Sam said, looking to Bobby. “Any idea of how to wrangle an angel?”

“None at all,” Bobby replied, “but we can look.”

“More research,” Dean sighed dramatically, slumping back onto the couch. “I don’t know about you guys, but I’m completely ready to just chill right here until Judgment Day. We could watch all the episodes of _Doctor Who_ as we count down to our imminent deaths.”

Castiel sent Dean an annoyed look, and Dean scowled back. Castiel grabbed one of the books on Bobby’s desk stacked in a separate pile, all of them on anything to do with angels, and tossed it to Dean. Dean caught it, turning it over in his hands, before he blew the dust off of the top, blinking against the sting of the dust he just blew into his face.

“Research,” Dean sighed again. “ _Great_.”

But Castiel knew, the same as Sam and Bobby knew, what Dean was doing. They knew it wasn’t Dean giving up, but Dean being worried and scared. They were each the same in their own different way—Castiel suddenly had the urge to melt into the ground and disappear, Sam was pouring over three books at once, and Bobby was tapping the book in front of him calmly as he looked into the fire, his brow furrowed as if thinking of a way out of here. As if there was anywhere they could go to escape it.

Castiel closed his eyes, thinking of Dean’s lips on his and Dean’s hands heating his skin through his shirt and how happy the day had been until this, and then he got to work, the memory of Hell on his heels and the fear of the unknown future weighing down on him like a ton of bricks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Currently not as edited as I normally edit, so I apologize for any roughness. 
> 
> My tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com


	8. Call to Arms

They chose to do it in Bobby’s barn, which was probably the best and worst idea—best because it was easy and convenient and no one would notice the graffiti, but the worst because it would be a hell of a pain in the ass to fix if the structure was destroyed by an angel angry at being summoned. They spent most of the evening painting sigils onto the walls, trapping sigils from every book they could find, even ones that they knew weren’t for angels— _anything_ , since Dean was convinced not to trust their Heavenly new friend—and, when the sky was dark, they stood in the middle of the metal barn, looking around at their handiwork. They were all armed with a gun and a knife, and they were all tense and ready to go.

There was only one problem—they found no book in Bobby’s library with the knowledge of how to summon an angel, no incantations or spells or anything. So they were standing there, fully prepared for a fight, but with no way to bring the other half of the fight to them.

“She seems to have a liking for you,” Dean told Castiel from where he was sitting casually on one of Bobby’s worktables, checking his teeth for food in the reflection of his knife blade. “Maybe you should just try actually calling her by name. She might skip right down off of her cloud and come at your beck and call.”

“I doubt it,” Castiel said, sighing, “but we don’t have any other choice.

Bobby, Sam, and Dean eyed the entrances carefully as Castiel wandered to the middle of the room, clearing his throat awkwardly. He looked to Dean helplessly but he only offered him a smile, and Castiel wasn’t struck with a whole lot of confidence—he could tell Dean was hoping she didn’t show at all. Castiel looked up at the ceiling.

“Anna?” he called out, wincing when his voice echoed from the ceiling back to him. “Uh, it’s . . . It’s Castiel. I need to talk to you.”

They waited, but nothing happened. Castiel tried again.

“Anna,” he called a little louder this time. “Come on. I need to ask you something. Anna? Come on. Don’t be like that. You burnt your hand onto my wrist and you said my ass was firm—I thought we had a connection.”

Sam choked on a laugh, but there was no other response. Castiel frowned around at his company, shrugging.

“I think it’s safe to say she doesn’t actually like me that much,” Castiel enlightened them. “So now what?”

“I have no idea,” Bobby said. “I could try to find something in the house that might work. But that’s only _might_.”

Castiel nodded once, looking around the room like something might inspire him. Dean lounged back again while Sam started pacing restlessly—he had been that way, anxious, ever since the apocalypse revelation. Bobby just watched Castiel think, knowing that he would come up with something, and Castiel had something—but he wasn’t all that happy about it. He let out a long sigh, looking around again, but he knew that his idea was the only thing that might actually work on short notice.

“Alright,” Castiel said resolutely. “No one judge me for this.”

He slowly bent down, his knees hitting the ground in the middle of the barn, setting his weapons down carefully beside him. His audience watched him as he cleared his throat again before curling his fingers together and raising his entwined fingers up, taking on a position to pray. Dean’s eyes widened in shock.

Castiel took a deep breath.

“Anna,” Castiel said, and he felt the same static on his skin as he had at Pamela’s, so he glanced around but she was not there. “Anna, please. I need your help—I need to ask you a couple of questions. You’re the only one I can trust. I—I assume you can hear me, which is awesome because that means angels have been ignoring my prayers since I was a kid, but I’m willing to let that slide if you just come down here and talk to me. Please. You said at Pamela’s that it wasn’t the last time we would speak to each other, and, right now, I really need to hear what you have to say.”

Silence and static. Castiel glanced around again, not moving from his position.

“Anna?” he asked.

The main doors to the barn flew open to reveal Anna, her arms crossed over her chest. Castiel scrambled to his feet, abandoning his weapons. She took a step in, and then another, glancing around curiously at the markings on the wall, clicking her tongue.

“Look harder next time,” she told them, smiling.

“Anna,” Castiel said, stepping forward. Dean and Sam shifted uneasily as Castiel approached her but made no move to stop him, for which he was thankful. Her eyebrows rose as Castiel stopped in front of her. He looked down into her eyes. “You knew this was happening, didn’t you?”

“Nice job with the witnesses,” she plainly said, and Castiel cursed, taking a step away from her.

“You knew?”

“I was made aware.”

“Thanks a lot for the angelic assistance—two hunters had their hearts ripped out of their chests.”

Anna didn’t respond, just watched him.

“I thought angels were supposed to be guardians,” Castiel thundered.

“Read the Bible,” Anna replied back sharply, her eyes flashing. “Angels are warriors of God. I’m a soldier. I’m not here to perch on your shoulder and give you advice—I’m here for much bigger concerns.”

“Concerns?” Castiel demanded. “Like the apocalypse?”

“Good,” she praised. “I was hoping I didn’t have to explain it all to you at a fifth-grade level.”

“So it’s real?” Castiel asked her, feeling cold. “It’s actually real. Genocide, monsters roaming the earth—where’s God now, soldier?”

It was the wrong thing to say. Anna visibly bristled, and the lights overhead flickered. The sound of a storm started up outside, and petite Anna seemed to grow bigger than the size of the room when she stepped up to Castiel, as fearless as the soldier she claims to be.

“There _is_ a God,” she told him firmly, through her teeth. “The Lord works—”

“Do _not_ say anything about _mysterious ways_ ,” Dean snapped from behind Castiel, and Castiel had completely forgotten that he and Anna had an audience. “I swear to your awesome God that I will shoot you if you do.”

“Go ahead,” she heckled him. “None of that can harm me. None of you have the equipment to hurt me.”

Castiel watched her wander back, getting a better view of the room in case of an attack. He followed her carefully with his eyes, just as much of a toy soldier as she was, and she noticed his gaze, not commenting on it.

“Back to the topic of the apocalypse,” Castiel stated flatly.

“Ah, yes, that’s why we’re here, of course,” Anna replied, smirking. “Big things afoot.”

“What kind of things?” Castiel demanded, temporarily ignoring the way she said the first statement, the way she acknowledged _we_ , like she meant herself and Castiel instead of herself and other angels. She looked him right in the eye.

“I suppose you need to know this, as much as you won’t want to,” she said. “The rising of the witnesses was only the beginning. The witnesses are one of sixty-six seals.”

“I’m guessing that’s not a show at SeaWorld.”

“Those seals are being broken by Lilith.”

“ _She_ did the spell? She raised the witnesses?”

Anna nodded. “And not just here. Twenty hunters around the world are dead.”

“She picked the victims that hunters couldn’t save to keep them preoccupied,” Castiel snorted. “I see now.”

“Lilith has a special sense of humor,” Anna agreed.

“Well, we put the spirits back to rest,” Castiel explained. “We got the spell and they’re gone.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Anna replied. “The seal was broken. The witnesses rose.”

“Why is she breaking the seals at all?”

Anna pursed her lips before responding. “Think of the seals as locks on a door.”

Castiel was starting to see where this was going, and he didn’t think he was going to like it when he asked, “And what happens when the last lock is unlocked?”

Anna looked him right in the eye and responded, “Lucifer walks free.”

“ _Lucifer_?” Castiel asked her, feeling a shock to his system. “Lucifer is just—Lucifer is a story they tell at demon Sunday school. He’s not actually _real_.”

“Three days ago, you didn’t believe in me,” Anna pointed out, spreading her hands. “Why do you think we are walking among humans for the first time in over two thousand years?”

“To stop Lucifer,” Castiel whispered, closing his eyes.

“That is why we have arrived, yes.”

“Well, stellar job with the witnesses,” Castiel told her curtly, sourly. “Not only did you let a seal break, but you lost twenty human soldiers that would have been on your side. Angels certainly are beacons of hope.”

Anna stiffened again. The storm outside raged louder, banging against the top of the barn roof.

“We tried,” Anna hissed, her eyes flashing like lightning, her voice carrying like thunder. “There are other battles, other seals. Our numbers are not unlimited—I have lost six brothers in the field this week alone. You think the armies of Heaven should just follow you and the Winchester brothers around like guard dogs? There is a bigger picture here.”

Anna stepped forward, close enough to Castiel that he felt his hair raise with the static cling of the lightning in her eyes.

“You should show me some respect,” she growled. “I dragged you out of Hell. I can throw you back in.”

Castiel heard his friends shift behind him, obviously moving forward, the threat obvious and dangerous. Anna’s eyes snapped over Castiel’s shoulder, looking at them, and her lips twitched spastically like she was torn between smiling and growling. She took a step away from Castiel and breathed for a moment, looking at him curiously. And then she smiled.

“Let’s do this without the bodyguards, hmm?” she asked.

She snapped her fingers and Castiel spun to watch his friends drop all at once, unconscious before they hit the ground. He breathed out in slight relief when he saw none of them had fallen on one of their knives, turning back to face Anna with a storm of his own brewing under his skin. She simpered at him, a smile twisting at the corners of her mouth.

“I’ve always hated going in front of an audience,” she explained with a sigh. “They’re fine—just unconscious until I leave again. They don’t need to hear the rest of this, anyway.”

“The rest of what?” Castiel demanded.

“Little explanations,” Anna explained, shrugging. “First, I need you to meet a friend of mine.”

“What—?” Castiel began to ask before a voice behind him greeted, “You must be Castiel Novak.”

Castiel started and whirled. A man who looked anything other than friendly was looming behind him, looking him up and down, like he was appraising him. Castiel glanced at Anna but she was completely unfazed, her eyes on the man who had just appeared.

“Castiel, this is Uriel,” Anna introduced lazily. “He’s a friend of mine.”

“Associate, please, Anna,” Uriel purred, and Castiel already didn’t like him. “We’re working.”

She smiled patiently, but her patience was obviously a little strained. Castiel felt a little reassurance at seeing that she didn’t seem to be a fan of the foreboding man, either.

“Why are you here?” Castiel asked. “Am I not enough for one angel to handle?”

“I’m here for a little push in the right direction,” Uriel rumbled in his threatening bass voice, his eyes sharp as knives as they cut right through Castiel. “Anna has told you about the seals and Lucifer, but you do not seem any more keen to stop it. Why?”

“I figured this was more of an angel fix,” Castiel informed them, glancing between the two angels. “Is that why you’re here? To ask for my help?”

“Not really to ask,” Uriel told him, turning to tower over Castiel, staring him down, but Castiel was not nearly as easily swayed. Castiel rose to his full height and stared down Uriel with a stubbornness he had learned long ago. Uriel’s eyes flashed with a hint of annoyance. “I’m here to tell you exactly what is at stake, and what will happen if you do not do as you are told.”

“I wasn’t aware that I was a glorified five year old,” Castiel commented sardonically.

“Listen here, mud monkey. I don’t give a damn what you do with your free time, you hear me? You could mack on a Winchester brother or paint your pretty pictures on some more walls for all I care. But you best be prepared to come when we call you, because these seals—they are no joke. Every time one of them breaks, the world is one step closer to the end of days.”

“When exactly am I going to be called?”

“When we need you to be,” Uriel told him, smiling lackadaisically. “I have a specialization, if you will, at purifying cities. You will be sent in to stop the seals. And, if you cannot, I will step in and fix it for you.”

“ _Purifying_ ,” Castiel hissed. “You mean _destroying_? Like Sodom and Gomorrah?”

“I may have had something to do with that,” Uriel purred, “yes.”

Castiel looked to Anna. “You can’t be serious.”

“This is war, Castiel,” Anna told him softly, not looking too pleased but not standing up and saying something either. “Those are our orders. Uriel and I are here to show you just how serious we are when we say that Lilith must be stopped.”

“I don’t know how to help you,” Castiel explained. “I don’t know what you want from me. I’m just an ordinary guy.”

Uriel laughed. “Castiel, the righteous man. We do not need you to constantly act as our errand boy. We will come to you when we need you, and you will serve, because that is what you do best.”

“And if I refuse?”

“Then your little friends die,” Uriel told him bluntly. “Slowly, and very painfully. And I’ll make you watch until you agree to do as you are told.”

Castiel wanted to punch him, he really did, but he knew absolutely no good would come out of him punching an angel. He took a step away from Uriel, turning back toward Anna, his eyes pleading. Her mouth twitched in pity but she steeled back up, back to the soldier.

“We came here to warn you of that,” Anna told him slowly, “as well as another, more dangerous threat. A couple of familiar faces are crawling their way out of Hell as we speak, and they will be gunning straight for you once they reach the surface. I suggest that you get on the road and keep moving as much as you possibly can—like I said, we are not your guard dogs, but I will come only if you desperately need my help. Do you understand me?”

“Loud and clear,” Castiel said, his voice acid. “Listen to my orders and keep my head down. You tell me to march left, I march left. I hear you loud and clear, Anna.”

“Good,” Uriel said, smiling. “It’s always nice when they understand us the first time.”

“I will return if you need me, but only then,” Anna repeated to Castiel, looking him in the eye before nodding once. “Good luck.”

Castiel blinked and they were gone. He looked around, half expecting Uriel to be standing behind him with a blade to his spine, but Brutus was nowhere to be found, and Castiel took a deep breath of the static air. He leaned down and picked up his useless weapons, setting them on a worktable, before leaning onto the surface, crossing his arms, waiting. Thirty seconds later, Dean let out a groan from the ground, and Sam pushed himself up, looking around.

“What’d we miss?” Sam mumbled, blinking, looking around until his eyes landed on Castiel. “You alright, Cas?”

“Peachy,” Castiel told Sam smoothly, coldly, still feeling residual anger from Uriel’s threats and Anna’s unwillingness to disobey even the slightest, bristling in irritation. He watched as the three grown men who had been knocked unconscious by a petite young redhead without being touched stirred, pulling themselves back onto their feet, blinking repeatedly as if they were just waking up from a long, long sleep.

Dean used a table to prop himself up, rubbing at his eyes. “We miss anything good?”

“Not much,” Castiel replied. “Just a new angel that threatened to wipe a few cities off of the map if I don’t fix their mistakes and then threatened to kill you three if I disobey.”

“Good times,” Dean said. “You alright?”

“Irritated with angels,” he explained stormily. “Disillusioned, really. These are the angels I have been praying to? This is the God that I have believed in? A God willing to watch the world burn, and angels willing to destroy half the planet to get what they want? What’s the use of praying if they aren’t even _listening_?”

The three of them watching his ranting without comment, their faces otherwise expressionless. And then Dean walked forward and clapped him hard on the shoulder, squeezing down in a touch that told him more than that, his eyes looking into his and telling a bigger story.

“Sounds like you need a drink,” Dean said, and grinned. “Drinks all around!”

“The angels said I should get the hell out of town as soon as possible,” Castiel enlightened them.

“Alright,” Dean said, unfazed. “Drinks for the road, then.”

Dean gave Castiel a look, silently asking if he was alright, and Castiel just weakly shook his head in response. Dean offered him a sympathetic look before heading back to the house with Bobby, who was muttering about how the damn angels had nearly given him a concussion, but Sam hung back, looking at Castiel closely.

“You know that it might just be _them_ , right?” Sam asked him softly, almost timidly. “The angels, I mean. You’re losing hope in them, but you’ve only met two of them. Maybe Anna and this other angel—maybe they aren’t like the others. Maybe the others are fair, and righteous, and merciful, the way that angels are supposed to be. Just because a couple of apples are rotten doesn’t mean the whole barrel is, you know? This sounds like something Dean would say, but—Babe Ruth was a dick, but baseball is still a great game, you know? For all we know, God hates these jerks in particular.”

“I don’t want to lose my faith,” Castiel told Sam, the only one who would truly understand, “but I can’t help it. The apocalypse, these angels—it’s so unlike what was written.”

Sam took a deep breath, thinking. And then he stepped forward, reaching to grip Castiel’s shoulder, looking him right in the eye.

“That doesn’t mean,” Sam said slowly, “that we can’t write our own story out of this. Maybe what’s written is bullshit, and it’s time we made our own story.”

Castiel looked at him for a long time. Sam grinned at him and squeezed his shoulder again before dropping his hand, leaning back on his heels.

“By the way,” Sam said, “you have bite marks on your neck.”

Sam burst out laughing as he walked away, toward the house. Castiel, meanwhile, kind of just hoped God would smite him where he stood—but maybe Sam was right. Maybe Castiel had been saved to write his own story out of all of this god-forsaken mess.

Maybe he didn’t have to give up his faith, even if he felt it failing.

Maybe his faith didn’t actually have to be in God and His angels.

Castiel stood in the barn for a long time, considering it, before he let out a long breath of a sigh, looking around before he picked up his weapons and started for the house, started for the life he had to go live, remembering the smirk that had curled on Uriel’s face when he called Castiel _the righteous man_.

He had a feeling he was in for a hell of a ride.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys!
> 
> I think I'm going to start posting a new story on Wednesday, so it would mean a lot to me if you all checked it out and let me know what you think about it!
> 
> Thank you all so much for reading!
> 
> My tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> x Slang


	9. When September Ends

The last few weeks of September melted away into an unusually cold October, and Castiel tried not to equate the odd temperatures with Hell freezing over. Bobby stayed back in South Dakota with his home and his books, and he was directing his hunter web from the hub like he always has been, acting as if he knew nothing of the events lingering darkly on the horizon. Castiel and the Winchesters had been on the move since the day Uriel and Anna had suggested it—Castiel thought Dean would have questioned it, due to his distrust toward angels, but Dean said nothing, and they began to work jobs again like there was nothing wrong. It felt like the old days, if Castiel let himself forget what Anna had said something about familiar faces targeting him in particular.

They caught the scent of demonic activity in central Pennsylvania when they put down a vengeful spirit in upstate New York and mutually decided to check it out. Castiel sat in the backseat of the Impala diligently, barely ever speaking a word, too lost in his own mind. He knew Dean was starting to worry—he didn’t exactly keep it a secret, shooting him worrisome glances when he woke up in the middle of the night to find Castiel cleaning his gun, looking at him like it pained him when Castiel became jumpier. Sleep was becoming something long since forgotten—his paranoia and worry was sinking in, and Castiel barely managed to get two hours a night.

Castiel never said it out loud, but he was thankful for the Winchesters for staying on the road with him, for watching his back against something they knew nothing about, just as worried about the impending threat as Castiel was outwardly showing. Knowing that they would have his back was soothing enough that Castiel managed to sleep at all, even if for barely enough time as it was.

Castiel’s relationship with Dean was still pawing a fragile line—they were more intimate with each other, yes, but nothing remarkably physical had happened since they had been alone at Bobby’s, and Castiel was wondering if it had all been a fluke in Dean’s eyes, if he had decided that he had been wrong about his feelings and was using separation as a way to ease them away from what they could be. But, even through the doubts, Castiel knew that wasn’t the case. It had been two weeks, and the three of them had been busy throwing themselves back into the hunting lifestyle, and although Sam so obviously knew something was brewing between the two, Castiel didn’t think that Dean was entirely comfortable around his brother with this new revelation of theirs, for whatever reason, and Castiel was willing to respect that. He wasn’t sure if he would be too comfortable with PDA around Sam, either.

So, in the last two weeks, the three of them had been hunting, Castiel hadn’t been sleeping, and Castiel still wasn’t a hundred percent sure about where he stood with Dean.

It had been an interesting couple of weeks, needless to say.

Dean checked them all into a motel on the edge of the town with the strange activity and dropped Sam off outside of the library so he could go through some information and figure out if the activity could actually be normal. Dean and Castiel headed back to the motel, and, the moment the door was closed, Dean grabbed Castiel by the belt loops and tugged him closer, smiling against Castiel’s temple when he stumbled into his chest, turning as red as a tomato. Castiel relaxed into Dean, leaning his head against his, and his hands curled around Dean’s waist.

“You going to tell me why you aren’t sleeping?” Dean murmured against Castiel’s skin, his eyelashes tickling as he opened and closed his eyes. Castiel sighed softly against his neck, his face pressed in the curve of Dean’s neck, breathing him in.

“Can’t turn my brain off,” Castiel explained softly, giving Dean the SparkNotes version of all of the problems and thoughts spiraling him into an inevitable mental breakdown somewhere down the line. Dean ran his hands up and down Castiel’s back soothingly, burrowing his head where Castiel’s neck meets his shoulder.

“You need to sleep, Cas,” Dean chastised him kindly. “You look like the walking dead.”

“I sleep a little bit,” Castiel argued weakly, knowing his side of the argument wouldn’t stand. “It helps to be working on a job—my brain and body get so tired that I actually get a couple of hours.”

“You’re a mess,” Dean chuckled, and Castiel couldn’t see him but he figured he would be rolling his eyes. “I mean, I understand, but seriously, you look like a good gust of wind would knock you over.”

“I’m fine,” Castiel yawned.

“Right,” Dean drawled skeptically, tugging Castiel over to the couch, pulling him down next to him. Castiel automatically pressed himself closer to Dean, his head nuzzled between his neck and shoulder. Dean’s hands around Castiel’s waist, pressing them against each other, were gentle but firm, like he didn’t want to let go. Castiel smiled a little, hidden by Dean’s t-shirt.

Castiel’s complaints were halfhearted and muffled as Dean nudged him off of his shoulder, and Castiel sat up a little straighter as Dean leaned around him, leaning on one hand, and Dean smirked before kissing him, his lips soft and his body warm and not taking a moment of hesitation before urging his lips open; feeling Dean’s breath in his mouth was maddening on an entirely different level of madness than he had ever known. He felt Dean grin against his lips and he wanted to hit him for it but they were too closely pressed against each other—Dean probably wouldn’t have even noticed it, one of his hands curling into Castiel’s hair.

Dean pulled Castiel closer, tugging at him insistently, and Castiel leaned into his warm body, fighting against the drooping of his eyelids as he kissed back with more of a passion—and a little bit of an agenda. Dean moaned into his mouth and kissed him hard, hard enough that Castiel had a feeling their lips would be red and swollen, and the thought of seeing Dean in that kind of state and knowing it was because of him made his heart race.

Castiel leaned against Dean, his hands tangling in the front of his shirt. Dean broke away gasping, the green in Dean’s eyes the only thing he could see, and he smiled lazily, his eyes lidded.

“Cas,” Dean whispered, his hand running through Castiel’s hair, making a shiver run down his spine.

Castiel closed his eyes and slumped forward, asleep before he hit Dean’s shoulder.

*

“So get this,” Sam’s voice cut through the dark, but then he suddenly stopped. Humor was working his way into his voice when Sam went, “Am I interrupting something?”

“He’s asleep, ass,” Dean muttered, and Castiel felt whatever warm thing he was laying on rumble like Dean’s voice had that kind of power, and Castiel squeezed his eyes shut, breathing calmly and evenly, at peace in this kind of dream. “He fell asleep on me.”

“Jeez, Dean, didn’t know you were that boring.”

“Shut the fuck up, Sam.”

“Wake him up—it’s about the job.”

Dean muttered something under his breath, definitely a swear and a threat to his brother’s life, before Castiel felt a warm hand on his shoulder, shaking him softly and pulling him out from the deep peace he had created in his mind. “Cas,” Dean’s voice coaxed from close by. “Cas, wake the hell up, dude.”

Castiel groaned, shaking Dean’s hand off, and he heard the sound of Sam’s muffled laughter. Castiel forced his eyes open, blinking against the dim light of the motel room, feeling confused. He looked up at Sam, who was standing over by the door, smirking and holding a set of printed papers in his hand. Castiel blinked, confused about the look on Sam’s face, before he realized that he wasn’t lying on the couch.

Castiel straightened up, turning red as he pulled away from Dean’s shoulder, untangling his hands from where they had been gripping at Dean’s shirt. Castiel looked between the brothers with wide eyes, his embarrassment making him wish he had the ability to melt back into the couch and disappear into his shame forever.

“Did I fall asleep?” he whispered, horrified. Dean’s lips twitched up into a grin.

“Yup,” he confirmed, his grin growing. “One second we were having a nice conversation, the next you’re using me as your own personal teddy bear.”

Castiel suddenly remembered that he and Dean had been making out on the couch, and that he must have fallen asleep in the middle of the action, and his horror increased sevenfold. He stared at Dean, speechless with his own shame, and his face must have been pretty hilarious because Dean laughed so hard it felt like the entire room started to shake.

“Take it easy, Cas,” Dean laughed, way too amused by a situation that made Castiel want to fling himself off of the nearest tall building. “Sam says he’s got something on the case.”

“Unless you want to take another power nap first,” Sam chimed in, gesturing. “If so, then by all means.”

“I hate you both,” Castiel muttered, shrinking over to the other side of the couch, trying to make himself smaller as he felt his face heating up again. “Just tell me what’s going on.”

Sam laughed before obliging, holding up the stack of papers in his hands. “These are all of the weird demonic things that have been happening around here. And get this—they’re all happening in the same place—a church.”

“A church?” Dean repeated, his eyebrows rising, leaning forward as it gained his interest. “I thought the last place demons would be able to go would be a church.”

“It’s hallowed ground,” Castiel said, “but weren’t the first demons angels?”

Dean frowned. “That’s reassuring.”

“It’s too late to check it out today,” Sam said, glancing to the windows, and Castiel realized with a shock that it was dark outside—which made him wonder exactly how long he had been out. “I say we let Cas get some more of his beauty sleep and check it out in the morning.”

The only response Castiel gave to Sam’s smart mouth was a middle finger. Sam laughed as he crossed the room, gathering a wad of clothes in his hand before ducking into the bathroom. Castiel turned to look at Dean, frowning at him.

“Why didn’t you wake me up?” Castiel demanded, annoyed. Dean laughed again, grinning so widely that there was wrinkles forming at the corners of his eyes.

“You were obviously exhausted if _that_ was when you could pass out cold,” Dean told him, wagging his eyebrows as Castiel felt his skin heat up in embarrassment again. “I knew you hadn’t been sleeping, so I let you sleep. Relax, Cas.”

“How long was I out?”

Dean shrugged, suddenly looking sheepish. “A while. Like, a whole television marathon of _Dr. Sexy M.D_.”

“You really need to stop watching that show. The title is extremely redundant.”

“Hey, leave me alone,” Dean said. “It’s a great show. Some of the most talented actors start in daytime TV.”

Castiel wanted to keep up the charade that he was irritated, but a smile foiled him. “You have to admit that the show is a bit on the ridiculous side.”

“You’re on the ridiculous side,” Dean muttered a response back, heaving himself off of the couch and stretching his back, making a face. “Try to sleep a little more, Cas, alright?”

“So I don’t fall asleep next time?”

“Look at you, Mr. Smart Mouth,” Dean replied. “All confident and teasing. I took you falling asleep as a personal offense, I’ll have you know. You owe me some major necking.”

Sam walked back into the room as Castiel was still laughing, and he flopped down onto the bed he had then claimed as his own, yawning. “I don’t care if you two flirt all night,” Sam said through the yawn, burying his face in the pillow, “but I’ll kill you if you keep me up.”

“Goodnight, Sam, Dean,” Castiel said, rolling his eyes before he slumped down on the couch, stretching his feet until they were hanging over the edge, using one of the cushions for a pillow. Dean threw him a blanket as he pealed off his outer layers of shirts unabashedly as Castiel watched him only a little creepily, watching his shoulders move under the t-shirt he was wearing. He was staring with so much concentration at Dean’s lean and fit torso he didn’t even see him unbutton his pants before they were falling onto the ground, heaped at his feet, leaving Dean in nothing more than a pair of black boxers that fit him a little too well.

Castiel suddenly closed his eyes, biting down hard on his cheek against his sudden urge to go over and wrap his arms around Dean, having to remind himself that it was not the time or the place. Dean turned off the light in the room, mumbling something about why did he always have be the damn housekeeper, before he hit the bed and both of the brothers were under in a matter of minutes. Castiel opened his eyes again, allowing them to adjust to the darkness, his body alive like a live wire. Castiel slowly sat up into a sitting position, crossing his arms over his chest and tucking his legs back onto the couch, breathing out.

It was going to be a long, sleepless night.

*

The church didn’t look like it was anything special—it was a white structure with a colorful stained glass pattern close to the top, where the point of the roof came together, the overlook of an attic space. Castiel leaned back against the Impala, looking it over, as Sam and Dean gathered some quick supplies from the trunk, a flask of holy water here and a silver knife there. Castiel hooked his head around to look at the Winchesters, his face apathetic.

“Are you sure this is it?” Castiel asked, not entirely impressed. “It doesn’t look like anything special.”

“Most of the activity has been reported right here at this church,” Sam told him, gesturing to the white building. “I don’t know about you, but that’s all the proof I need to check it out.”

Castiel shrugged, moving away from the car. Dean slammed the trunk closed, shuffling forward to walk beside Castiel, leaning a little closer to him.

“Did you sleep last night?” Dean asked conversationally, but the hard tone in his voice said that he already knew the answer, so Castiel didn’t bother to lie, shaking his head.

“Nope,” he replied honestly. “I don’t like the feel of this town.”

“Your gut feelings lately are pretty accurate,” Dean pointed out, and Castiel grimaced, hoping that these new instincts didn’t come hand in hand with his new ability to see invisible angels and read languages that he had never heard of. Castiel pushed open the door to the church only to find the sanctuary completely empty.

“Well, that’s a little weird,” Castiel murmured, and his voice carried in the otherwise still room. The Winchesters filed in after him, their hands hovering nervously over their weapons but, for some reason, Castiel wasn’t having the same reaction. He figured that something about Hell had changed him, because he felt like he could handle terrible situations without having the protection of a blade. He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his jeans before ambling into the building, looking around the room and seeing nothing suspicious.

He turned to find Dean examining the door for signs of a break-in, but Sam was watching Castiel, his eyebrows pressing against each other in a look of suspicion and concern.

“Nothing seems out of place,” Castiel stated, shrugging. “Might just be a fluke. We should take a look around while we can.”

“Right,” Sam said, but he didn’t sound too convinced, still looking at Castiel like he was a difficult mathematic equation that he would like to solve. Castiel ignored him and looked closely at the alter while Dean traced his way around the perimeter, Sam finally turning his gaze to check out the pews. Castiel glanced into a cupboard, but there was nothing but supplies for service, and Dean poked under the tablecloths but found nothing.

“It’s a little too much of a fluke if you ask me,” Dean stated when they found nothing weird in the room—when they found nothing at all, really. “We should probably start listening to your gut, Cas.”

“There are stairs,” Castiel pointed out, nodding to the staircase through a back hallway. “If there’s anything suspicious, it will probably be where people are less likely to walk in.”

Sam pulled Ruby’s knife out of his jacket pocket, and Dean chose his revolver, but Castiel started up the stairs first, completely empty-handed. He felt like Dean wanted to ask, but the three of them didn’t speak again until Castiel was nudging open the door to the attic space upstairs, the door the only destination, and Castiel poked his head into the room.

It was filled with what looked like junk the church had been collecting and didn’t know what to do with—costumes for nativity plays, old-fashioned trunks open and overfilled with papers, broken wardrobes slumped onto the floor. Castiel kicked the door open the rest of the way, scanning the walls and the floor, but there was nothing. Sam closed the door softly behind him, his knife still in his tensed hand.

“You’d think, with all of that activity around this place, there would be something to show for it,” Castiel thought out loud, turning to look at the Winchesters. “But there’s not even the smell of sulfur.”

“I don’t like this,” Dean announced moments before the door suddenly flung open with a force that almost knocked it off of its hinges, and Castiel’s head snapped to it in surprise as the Winchesters rounded on the doorway with their weapons.

Ruby stared back at them. “Great,” she hissed. “I should have known you dumbasses would be here.”

“Excuse me, bitch?” Dean demanded, scowling as he lowered his gun. “I don’t see anyone having invited you to this party.”

“Bickering later,” she snapped at Dean through her teeth, her eyes flashing between Sam and Castiel. “A big-time demon is heading here right now. This was a trap for you idiots—and you walked straight into it like it was a fucking strip club.”

“I hate you more and more every time you open your mouth,” Dean took the moment to tell Ruby.

Ruby ignored him, slamming the door shut before turning to look at Sam, right into his eyes. “Sam, you’re going to have to do it immediately, as soon as he walks in. We don’t have time to talk first and shoot later.”

“No way!” Dean snapped, his entire face darkening. “Don’t make him do more of that freaky shit if he doesn’t want to.”

“It might be the only thing that will get all of us out of here alive,” Ruby informed Sam, waving her arms. “Damn morality for a minute, alright? You have the power, so use it!”

“I’m completely lost,” Castiel stated casually from where he stood with his back to the picture window, his hands still in his pockets. “I assume I missed something big?”

“Visions and shit aren’t the only thing Sam can do,” Dean gave him the annotated version before turning back to start arguing with Ruby some more. “And that was okay—that’s involuntary, and he didn’t try to tap into it. But teaching him how to exorcise demons with his fucking _mind_ —”

“We’ve already talked about this,” Ruby growled, “and we don’t have the time right now. Sam, are you going to do it or not?”

Sam hesitated, his jaw clenching, before he nodded. “Yeah, yeah, I’ll try it,” Sam said, and then shook his head at his brother. “Don’t start. If that’s what it takes, then I’ll do it.”

“Hold on,” Castiel said clearly. “You can exorcise demons with your _mind_?”

Sam sent him an exasperated expression before they all froze, feeling something crawl through the room like an invisible fog, and Castiel felt the power of what was coming for them wash over his skin like a wave of an evil older than life itself. Castiel flinched back and Dean stumbled a few steps back, his face suddenly not all that confident as his eyes snapped to the door, and Ruby’s face paled. Sam, though, stood up a little taller, taking a deep breath.

“Careful, Sam,” Ruby whispered.

The door flew open.

Castiel and Dean both dove for cover, the sound too much like a gunshot, and Castiel hit the floor hard before Ruby yelled, “Now, Sam!” and there was a momentary pause before a nasally laugh built up from inside of their visitor, and Castiel pushed himself up, figuring it was safe to say that sound wasn’t a reassuring one.

Castiel got to his feet again as the new demon chided condescendingly, his voice like he was talking through his nose, “Now, now, Sam, don’t be _foolish_ —you don’t have the juice to send me back.”

The demon, a balding man with a long face and wild eyes, flicked one hand, and Sam flew across the room, hitting the wall and landing in a heap with a groan. Ruby skittered back several steps, staring at the demon in front of her with horror, like she knew it had been an A-lister but she hadn’t expected it to be _this_ one. The demon looked at her, tilting his head.

“You’re that Ruby bitch, aren’t you?” the demon drawled, his words slow and sickly acidic, disturbing. The demon paused before saying, “How about I deal with you later?”

Dean and Castiel stood up straighter as the demon turned to face them, a calm smile on its face, and it made him look calculating and evil and Castiel wanted nothing more than to blow his head off right then and there. The demon looked between the two of them, his eyes narrowing slightly like he was thinking.

Sam pushed himself back onto his feet shakily, nodding dismissively at Dean when he glanced to check on him, his grip on the knife tightening as he slowly stepped to join Ruby just behind where Castiel and Dean were standing, facing down a demon whose power flooded from him like a cloak of dark and despair, swallowing them whole. The demon was staring at Castiel, smiling, and Castiel stared back, his expression hard and cold.

“Well,” the demon purred. “Castiel Novak. I almost didn’t recognize you with skin.”

Castiel straightened, and it felt like the energy of a lightning strike just burst through his skin. His hands tightened and he felt his face pull tighter, colder, harder. Castiel’s jaw barely unclenched enough for him to growl one word, a name that he should have known ever since he felt the powerful energy touch him: “ _Alastair_.”

“It’s been too long, Castiel,” Alastair chimed, smiling. “You’re getting soft. I can tell, by that look on your face.”

“Go to Hell,” Castiel growled.

“Been there, and liked it so much that I stayed. But then the impossible happened—a couple of angels, wings and halos and all, burst into my little happy place and took one of my favorite souls. So the bossman sent me here, back up with these wretched humans, to go bring you back. You ready to go home now, Clarence?”

Castiel’s hand snapped forward, and the throwing knife he had been holding between his fingers since he had put his hands into his pockets cut through the air fast, sinking home right into Alastair’s heart. Alastair looked down at the blade, almost surprised, before he burst out laughing.

“Oh, Castiel, you never cease to surprise me!” Alastair thrilled, grinning at him. “How much fun you were, down on the Rack. I remember when I got to have the knife, when I got to make the cuts, and I miss that wonderful sound of your scream.”

“I’m not going back there,” Castiel said, wanted to say harshly, but he was surprised that his voice cracked, and his tone came out weak and wobbly. “You can try to drag me back, but I won’t go. And now I have some new friends that want me right where I am.”

“Ah, yes, the _angels_ ,” Alastair stated. “And where are they now, when you need their protection?”

“Dealing with scum more important than you.”

Alastair laughed again, shaking his head. And then he turned to look at Ruby, his smile curious.

“We’re going to have a talk, dear,” Alastair told her before he snapped his fingers and she was gone, and he was turning back to Castiel, his eyes flashing. Castiel reached out with both hands and grabbed handfuls of the Winchester’s clothes, tugging them to start walking backwards, and they moved with him. Alastair crept forward, pulling the knife roughly from his vessel’s heart, sighing. “Castiel, look at what you’ve done—you’ve _ruined_ the pediatrician.”

Castiel stopped moving when they reached the spot he needed them to be at, and he let his hands fall defenselessly down to his sides. Alastair looked at Castiel closely, twirling the knife in between his fingers like only a man who handled knives could, and he sighed.

“ _Castiel_ ,” he chided. “Don’t do that.”

Castiel didn’t listen.

He took a running start, and then he was crashing sideways through the stained glass window, taking the whole blunt of it as the Winchester brothers followed closely behind him. He heard Alastair start laughing as they crashed into the jutted roof beneath them and rolled off, hitting the ground hard. By the time Castiel pushed himself onto his feet, the laughter was silent. Castiel looked up at the window to find Alastair gone, nowhere to be seen and, for some reason, that wasn’t at all reassuring.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My new story, LOSING GRACE, currently has two chapters up, and I will love you forever if you checked it out!
> 
> Thank you all for reading!
> 
> x Slang


	10. Heaven and Hell

“Goddamn, my arm fucking _hurts_ ,” Dean groaned from where he was slumped in a chair, gripping at his shoulder. “When one of you can fit some time into your busy schedules, I have a dislocated shoulder I wouldn’t mind having some help with.”

The needle dropped from between Castiel’s teeth for a moment so he could hiss, “I am stitching myself up with my _teeth_ — _you need to leave me the fuck alone_.”

“I got it,” Sam moaned, rolling closer to Dean on the bed, heaving himself up into a sitting position as Dean walked over, bending down. “On three, alright? One—”

Sam cracked Dean’s shoulder back in. Dean held back a pained yell through his teeth, reaching over and grabbing the booze bottle from the nightstand and taking a long chug. Castiel tugged his head back, tightening the stitch, the needle grasped tightly between his teeth. He groaned at the stiffness in his neck and the flash of pain that came with his movement.

“That probably wasn’t my smartest idea,” Castiel moaned, reaching out and yanking the booze bottle from Dean’s hand and upturning it on the large gash he was fixing on his arm, hissing loudly. Castiel shoved the bottle back, his hands shaking, wounds on his hands still not treated and stinging wildly. Castiel collapsed against the bed, suddenly unable to breathe.

“Jesus, Cas,” Dean muttered, kneeling down next to him. “Are you alright?”

“A bit dizzy,” Castiel responded, breathing out a long breath before forcing himself to sit up again, placing the needle back in between his teeth and moving to make the next stitch. Dean scowled, plucking the needle carefully from Castiel’s mouth, taking over the stitching. Castiel looked at him, shocked, but Dean was staring carefully at what he was doing, frowning in concentration.

“So you knew that guy?” Dean suddenly asked Castiel, not looking at him. Castiel stiffened, feeling his expression harden in some sense of self-preservation, and Sam looked over curiously to catch Castiel’s reply.

“I wish I didn’t,” Castiel said coldly, staring ahead of him. “Before you ask, yes. Everything he said was true.”

Dean’s fingers fumbled only slightly as he tied off the stitching before he murmured, “What did he mean with the skin thing?”

“The souls from the crossroad contracts go to Alastair, where he likes to call the Rack,” Castiel explained slowly, no emotion in his voice. “When you’re there, he does whatever he wants to do. Every single day, I was torn apart, but I couldn’t lose consciousness, couldn’t die. I just had to watch them cut into me, watch them rip off my skin piece by piece until there was nothing left. And then I was whole again, and they started right back at the beginning.”

Dean had to set down the needle, his hands shaking too hard to hold it anymore. Castiel turned to look at them, Dean staring down at his shaking hands curling tightly into the comforter, Sam looking like he was about to run to the bathroom to be sick. Castiel laughed humorlessly, a dark sound.

“Every day, for decades, just pain and torture and wanting to die, but you’re already dead,” Castiel muttered, shaking his head. “I don’t know why I hadn’t realized sooner what Hell would be like.”

“Who would expect that?” Dean asked softly, his voice cracking. “Cas—”

“Don’t,” Castiel said, his voice too icy when he looked at Dean with fire. “ _Don’t_ give me your pity—I don’t want it. I lived it, I got out, and now I’ve got a fresh start.”

“I can’t breathe,” Dean said, and then he suddenly got to his feet, stumbling out of the motel room, slamming the door hard behind him. The door vibrated on its hinges.

Sam reached up, running a hand shakily through his hair. “God, Cas, I’m so sorry,” Sam whispered brokenly, his eyes filled with emotion. “You were down there because of me, with Alastair, and I—I didn’t know. I never thought—never knew what—I didn’t know what Hell was.”

“None of us did,” Castiel pointed out, taking a long breath. “I don’t blame you for it, Sam. I would take the hits again if it meant you were alive and alright up here.”

“It wasn’t _worth_ it,” Sam told him, his voice shattered. “Jesus, Cas, do you ever think of yourself first?”

“I lived a long time alone,” Castiel replied flippantly. “It’s about time I had some people to put first in my life.”

“What is all of this about, Castiel?” Sam demanded, turning to face him directly, his face crumpled in on itself with devastation that made Castiel recoil. “Why are you pretending to be okay, when you’re just human?”

“I know what I’m worth,” Castiel stated.

“Dean told me about this,” Sam announced. “He told me that you said you didn’t think you were important, like you’re not worth a _million_ of me. Newsflash, Cas, but you _are_ , and you want to know why? Because, if I had been dead like I should have been, I wouldn’t have been up here training with Ruby to learn how to send demons back downstairs with my _mind_. I wouldn’t have been dealing with something dark, something I _know_ is dark and I don’t know what it means, but I want to help people so I do it. You were down there, _suffering_ for me, getting _torn apart_ because you didn’t think you were worth better, when I was running around after Ruby and dealing with all of the darkness that the Yellow-Eyed Demon put into me. So if you want to sit there and tell me that you’re worthless, I might fucking hit you, Castiel, because you’re _far_ from worthless. You gave yourself to the hellhounds willingly to save my brother, and you gave up your soul to give me a life. You do these things, time and time again, not realizing you are the fucking purest person anyone has ever met. So if you want to say you deserved that torture, that it was for the greater good, then don’t, because I can’t fucking hear that anymore when you’re the last person on this earth that deserves to go through something like that. You hear me?”

Castiel glanced up at Sam, torn between being angry, insulted, and extremely honored. Sam stared at him, intensity shining in his eyes, and Castiel nodded slowly, trying to swallow.

“I used to think I was worthless, before Hell,” Castiel whispered, “but now, after it—now, I _know_ I am.”

“Worthless enough,” Sam replied, “that God wanted to save you?”

Castiel stared at him, not knowing how to answer.

“You matter, Cas. You matter a lot. But you’ll never realize that if you don’t let yourself.”

Castiel didn’t say anything, because there was nothing to say. He knew Sam was wrong, knew it the same way he knew his name, but he knew that, if he said it, it would just be a big fight and he didn’t want to fight with Sam. So he just ignored it completely, not letting his mind dwell on _You matter a lot_ because he couldn’t, because it might be enough to kill him, so he turned back to looking on at the cut on the back of his right hand, the wound on his left palm and fingers. He clenched his jaw, fighting back the emotion in his throat.

“Do you want me to help you with your hands?” Sam asked him softly.

Castiel hesitated, and then said, “Please.”

And, in some unwritten way, that made them okay again. The tension in the atmosphere disappeared, for the most part, and they sat calmly as Sam bandaged Castiel’s hands carefully, meticulously, and Castiel thanked him softly when he finished. Castiel crossed the room and lowered himself down onto the couch, closing his eyes, but he didn’t intend to sleep, only to pretend to. He listened as Sam moved around for a moment before the door closed quietly behind him, inevitably off to find Dean, and it was only then, when Castiel was sure he was alone, that he let the tears he had been holding back fall free.

In that time alone, Castiel cried—mourning for who he had been before Hell and who he had become after it, for the way it still haunted him, for the way he knew he would never be able to escape it. He cried, and he mourned, and he wanted to believe.

_You matter a lot._

But he couldn’t believe it. Not when he was broken, he was destroyed, and he was falling apart.

He couldn’t matter.

*

Castiel was sure Bobby would soon associate him and the Winchesters showing up at his door as a sign that they were about to make a stupid decision that would inevitably come back to bite them in the ass. This time, Bobby only rolled his eyes when they told him what they had planned, and he only called them dumbasses four times, a generous attitude for the older man to have. Castiel ducked out not long after and secluded himself with the book foretelling the horrors of the apocalypse in Bobby’s barn, chewing on his lip until it bled.

The ride back to Bobby’s had been tense, so tense that Castiel had barely been able to breathe for the first half of the ride until Dean rolled the windows down and played the music so loud that it almost made Castiel forget, but not entirely.

Back in the motel room, he had fallen asleep, exhausted from shattered glass and an impressive fall, as well as quite a release of devastated emotions with his throat aching and his eyes stinging. Dean and Sam had returned sometime after Castiel had slumped against the couch and slipped out of consciousness, so he had woken to Sam rousing him a few hours after he had gone to sleep, telling him that they had to ditch town before Alastair returned, even if Castiel knew better—he knew Alastair would never be that stupid. He would sit back and he would wait to strike when he knew he would have the upper hand and, since he had Ruby, they were sure that wouldn’t take long.

Castiel hadn’t spoken one word to Dean since he had woken. He just grabbed his bag silently, changed in the bathroom, and squeezed toothpaste into his mouth and spit it outside of the motel as they left. The car ride had been next to silent, only with Sam and Dean bickering in their brotherly way about the music choice and how putting on a normal radio station for a few hours wouldn’t kill them, and Castiel had been able to pretend it was normal at least for a little while.

He all but ran out of Bobby’s house the moment he had the chance. He took up his refuge at one of the worktables in Bobby’s barn, the symbols faded away already, probably by Bobby’s hand. Castiel sat there with his book, unable to properly process the words, and he waited.

Three hours barely passed. He didn’t even look up when he felt the wash of power over his back, resigned.

He knew who he had to protect. And he knew they were in the house and, as long as Alastair got what he wanted, he would be too busy having fun with Castiel in the Pit to come back and attack them unexpectedly.

Sam tried to tell Castiel that he mattered, but, the moment Castiel turned around to face Alastair, he knew he only mattered in a way that could never be good.

“Castiel,” Alastair chided in that condescending, mocking slur of his, his head tilted to the side with a belittling smile. “I am . . . disappointed. I expected a much better show than this. You seemed the dramatic type, same as me.”

“Well, as it turns out, I’m still a little sore,” Castiel replied coldly, and Alastair’s lips twitched into a satisfied smirk like a waking snake.

“It’s nothing of the pain you felt in the Pit,” Alastair hummed knowingly, able to see right through him in a way that made Castiel feel like skin and bone would never be able to protect him. “You’re barely even blinking because you now know what true pain feels like.”

“I was screaming,” Castiel whispered, “even after you gave me the knife.”

“I told you it would go away,” Alastair conceded slowly, “but I didn’t say that you wouldn’t do something to yourself once it was gone. See, Castiel, you’re the strangest of them all—you’re a special little bird, even before you knew anything about just how important you are the flying dicks upstairs. You could withstand pain, but not enough of it. And then, the moment that I took it away, I could see it in your eyes—you wanted it _back_. You wanted to feel that pain, because it was _something_ to feel. You didn’t realize how _empty_ you would be.”

Castiel’s hands tightened. He wasn’t holding a weapon, or anything that could be used as a weapon, and maybe that was his first mistake. It was just he and Alastair in the barn, looking at each other, the dark power twisting like tendrils of toxic smoke through the air. Castiel felt the lives in the home behind him burning into his neck, the heat practically branding a permanent selfless abandon into his blood.

Alastair glanced around, his face unimpressed. “You destroyed all of the demon-trapping sigils. I thought you would be smarter than that.”

“I want to know what you want from me,” Castiel said.

Alastair let out one shocked laugh before he grinned to himself, shaking his head fondly like Castiel was nothing but a confused animal. He leaned forward, so close that his breath brushed Castiel’s face, and he thought he would be sick. “I’ve already done what I have had to do with you, Castiel. The rest of it is just for fun.”

“What does that mean?” Castiel demanded, wanting to step forward and into Alastair’s space but knowing he was much too close already. “I don’t want to hear riddles anymore—I want to know why you were ordered to find me.”

“For reasons that you would never believe if I told you,” Alastair told him slowly, laughing. “So I’m going to wait until you’re ready—until I know you’ll be able to handle it.” Alastair reached up, his hand hovering with an inch of air between his hand and Castiel’s cheek, and Castiel observed the closeness with cold panic. “I have already seen you break, Clarence. But, damn—you will never imagine what it’s like to _shatter._ And I’m going to destroy you, Castiel. I am going to burn that big heart out of you until there is nothing left, and I’m going to rub the ashes into the dirt—and you won’t be nearly as special anymore, when I am done with you.”

“How did you know to find me here?” Castiel asked, diverting the conversation after a brief pause, and Alastair rolled his eyes before he snapped his fingers and Ruby, chained and coated in blood, stumbled out of thin air and sunk to the floor, unable to hold herself up. She looked straight at Castiel before her gaze flickered back to Alastair, and her lips curled up in a snarl.

“Ruby knows a thing or two about Bobby Singer,” Alastair explained unnecessarily, shrugging. “It doesn’t take a genius to realize you pathetic orphans will flock to the only place you have when you’re injured. The babies return to mommy to tell her all about their bumps and bruises, to tell her how mean that man was to them.”

Alastair was a sick, twisted individual, and Castiel’s hair stood on end when he tipped his head back and laughed, his eyes bright with amusement as he looked at Castiel, feeding off of his disgust and discomfort like only a demon ever could. He looked at Castiel up and down.

“You’re a mess, Castiel,” Alastair told him with a smothered smile. “You’re used to the pain—but it’s still a different pain up here. It’s . . . fascinating. I want to study it—and maybe you will be my first subject. Maybe I’ll just take you with me, my little pet project, and figure out what I can do to you before your life fades from your eyes, and you can’t scream for that little boyfriend of yours.”

Castiel’s rage flared, and he was barely able to control his temper, knowing he would have to, but he knew there was only a few ways this could end. He looked at Alastair and prayed for the ending he would like, but he didn’t know how the next few minutes might end up playing out.

He looked at Alastair carefully, but Castiel didn’t have to be trained like a warrior to know that he would not be able to walk away from a fight one-on-one with his injuries. He would have to have an upper hand.

So he gathered a little faith and said to Alastair, “I think I’m more important than you think I am.”

Alastair opened his mouth to respond when Anna blindsided him, striking him hard in the back of his head and sending him stumbling, almost to the ground. Uriel stood to Alastair’s other side, but Castiel looked only to Anna with a burning feeling in his chest when she met his eyes, stunned and angry and sad, and he just stared back to her with a sickly calm spreading through his body, a calm he knew too well.

He remembered the nights in Hell he liked to forget—he liked to forget when he began to lose his mind, clawing at his skin, his gut aching for a feeling of something, _something_ , human or not, and becoming more frenzied when he felt nothing. He remembered his nails digging into his skin at first and then when it wasn’t enough, and he had sought the odd reassurance of the feeling of his torture, of the constant numbing pain he had felt, remembering the relief of numb. It had been such a different kind of numb than afterward—before he had agreed to Alastair, the numb was his willpower, burning with the pain but rising above it. And he had felt it the strongest when he was under the knife, when he was screaming as tortures he never should have been able to live through were happening. He remembered the long dark nights of muttering, of clawing, and, eventually, of mutilation.

His arms and chest began to sting, remembering the phantom blades he drove through his skin, and Castiel was suddenly too hot. He was burning, and his hands were twitching, and Anna was watching him fall apart and Uriel looked like he wanted to laugh and Ruby was watching Castiel, and he could have sworn she looked just as entertained as Uriel.

Castiel began to lose it as Alastair stirred from the floor, groaning. He glanced up at the angels, frowning.

“That’s not very polite,” he scolded them with a frown. “I don’t even know your names. Let me buy you a drink first.”

“Demon scum,” Anna hissed, her eyes flashing. “ _Alastair_ , of them all. Of course. We should have known you would go looking for Castiel.”

“He’s special,” Alastair cooed again, and Castiel wanted to scream and shake him, wanted to know what that meant because it was obvious there was something he didn’t know. But Anna just pulled a blade from her jacket and stood over Alastair, almost as if she was waiting for the first move, and Uriel was mirroring her every movement, watching Alastair carefully.

And Castiel was losing it. His skin was too hot, and he couldn’t breathe.

Alastair smiled innocently up at the angels and said, “You stole my favorite chew toy.”

Castiel had known it would happen—that was why he had told the Winchesters and Bobby to not come into the barn, to let him walk Alastair into the trap alone. It was why Sam told Ruby to lead the demon to the barn if it went wrong, to give him this information, and he put them right where they were planning for him to be. And Castiel remembered Anna’s promise—that she would come to help him if he needed it desperately.

And he felt like he was giving Anna a Christmas present, bringing her Alastair. She tried not to let it show, but she looked smug as she watched the demon before her on the ground, submissive to her, and Castiel had to remind himself that Anna was a warrior, a soldier, and that she had seen her fair share of battles and blood, and that she, too, was a monster.

Castiel had known it would happen. He knew he would snap, and he knew what he was going to do. And it was the exact reason why the Winchesters were not here, because he knew what they would do, what they would say.

They would try to stop him. But he had a feeling that Anna, Uriel—he had a feeling they would _watch_.

So Castiel reached over and grabbed the only weapons he had stashed in the room and dove at Alastair, slamming into his body on the ground hard, and surprisingly catching the senior demon off guard. Alastair tried to buck him off but Castiel had leverage, his knees pressing into Alastair’s shoulders and his hands on his wrists. Castiel took only a moment to pull his arm back—and slam the metal stake through Alastair’s hand, burying it into the dirt-packed floor.

Alastair’s screams were pained and inhuman and shrieking, so much so it felt like the sound was pealing at Castiel’s skin, and he felt a rush of pleased adrenaline kick into his system. He used Alastair’s temporary incapacitation to drive the second metal stake through his empty hand—the Devil’s trap carved onto the top flickering against the light, blood pooling beneath Alastair’s hands. Castiel shoved himself up from the demon, circling him like a predator hunts prey, and Alastair continued to scream, his face contorted in pain.

But, soon enough, the screams turned into laughter. Anna and Uriel watched, Anna flabbergasted and Uriel stoic, as Castiel watched Alastair giggle from the floor, cringing and flinching in pain, but the terrible screams were falling into hysterical laughter, and Castiel watched the convulsions roll through Alastair’s body as he laughed through what must be the worst pain a demon could feel. But Alastair wasn’t just a demon, and Castiel could be completely sure that he was adapting to the pain, feeding off of it, but they rested assured that he would not be able to get away.

Alastair laughed, tilting his head so he could see the metal spikes through his hands, holding him down as they dug deep into the dirt ground. He let his head fall forward, chin against his chest, and giggled more.

“There it is,” Alastair laughed, smiling. “ _There_ is the man who mutilated himself because he realized he missed the pain—there he _is._ _There_ is my heartless, bloodthirsty apprentice. Not nearly worthy of angels, are you, Clarence?”

Castiel just stared at him, feeling his eyes burning, feeling his whole entire body and mind shifting back into Hell, shifting back into the heartless, merciless monster he had to become. He turned back into the man who had begun to enjoy the torture, that took a sick pleasure out of it—a pleasure he couldn’t have unless he felt the splitting of his own skin, felt the warmth of his own blood as it ran down his wrists in the rush of a heart that wasn’t beating.

Hell was half of a hallucination, everything a soul builds around itself, but Castiel could still feel the Hell strongly inside of him, pulsing under the light he tried to cover it with. Castiel wanted so much to be the same man, to be good, to be everything that Dean deserved—but he was still who he was in Hell, and it wouldn’t change. He was still the same man who didn’t blink as someone screamed, who itched to feel the soothing sting of an open wound hitting the air.

Castiel felt the cruel smile twisting onto his face as he looked down at Alastair, and Alastair looked up at him like he was having the best day of his life.

“You had so much _potential_ , Castiel,” Alastair announced, gazing up at him with bright eyes. “But, with all of that darkness inside of you—maybe you still do.”

Castiel started toward Alastair again, wanting more blood, but he felt strong hands grab at him, shove him away hard. He stumbled, blinking at Anna like he was in a trance, staring at her in surprise when he saw the horror on her face, the smugness she had felt melting away into something terrified, something sick and disappointed.

And he knew it was him. He knew that look well. He wasn’t a stranger to seeing eyes looking at him with that same expression, and he had known it would only be a matter of time before it began again.

Anna held out her hand, cautioning him against stepping forward toward Alastair again, and she gave him a look of so much emotion that he hesitated, the light that he had shoved into the background twisting, pushing, trying to come back to life. His heart was slowing, and his hands were covered in blood.

“Castiel,” she hissed, horrified. “That is _enough_.”

Alastair laughed loudly, his voice crashing from the walls, closing in on Castiel. “Look at him,” Alastair cooed, pleased. “I made him _perfect_.”

Anna glanced toward Alastair for just a moment before her eyes cut to Ruby, who was a silent bystander on the outskirts of the action, her eyes wide as she watched it all. Anna’s face turned into disgust when she hissed, agitated, “Is there a reason you’re still here, _stain_?”

Ruby’s eyes flashed, but she said nothing, just disappeared, leaving the chains behind. Anna looked to Uriel, who was simply watching Alastair’s movements carefully, almost hungrily, before she looked back at Castiel, her fear of him making his stomach turn dangerously, and his light was able to take a hold of his mind and pull itself back into commission, taking a refuge at the helm, snapping him back into his conscience. Castiel blinked, feeling the dread and fear in his stomach, and Anna’s eyes softened only slightly as they stared at each other, the air static around them as neither blinked.

“Castiel,” she muttered, and she sounded so disappointed that he was almost physically ill, seeing an ethereal* being so let down, so sad and betrayed, and knowing he had done this, that his darkness might be something enough that Heaven might decide he wasn’t special enough to save after all and throw him head over heels back into Hell again. She paused before taking a deep breath, her eyes tracing back to the other side of the room, focusing on something.

“Castiel,” she said again, his voice an iron growl, her eyes flashing dangerously like uncontrolled lightning. “Do try to keep control of that darkness. I know my orders if you get too dangerous—I am to _obliterate_ you if you prove too unstable. Save us all the trouble, why don’t you?”

Then Anna, Uriel, and Alastair were gone, and the air of the barn was stiff and still and filled with residual static from Anna’s betrayal and anger. Castiel took a deep breath, his fingers curling into his hands and rubbing the blood, and he turned to walk out of the barn

and

froze.

He saw Dean first, and his horror was a palpable pressure in the air, pressing down on him until Castiel couldn’t breathe, and Dean’s eyes sparked in an additional surprised horror when he saw the way Castiel’s hands were curling into the blood, like they were finding it soothing, and Castiel just stared at them, horrified at himself, at his own unexpected dark passenger that came from centuries of torture, on the table and with the knife. Dean was pale, looking at him in surprise and panic, and that look that he gave him—like he didn’t recognize him—snapped Castiel back into his skin better than an electric shock ever could.

Sam and Bobby stood behind Dean, watching Castiel with similar expressions, but Dean’s was the only one that tore at him like the claws of the hellhounds, ripping out his insides in a way he never thought could happen with that pain when he wasn’t on the table in the Rack, but he felt it here, felt it in the way Dean was looking at him. Castiel was frozen and he and Dean were staring at each other, Dean getting a good look at the person Castiel had become—Castiel was almost afraid to know, but he asked the question almost automatically:

“How much did you hear?”

Dean’s face flinched for a second before he replied, his voice sharper on his skin than being dragged on gravel, Castiel noticing the choked way he spoke like he was speaking through heavy emotion, “We heard Alastair screaming. We thought—”

“You would be surprised who you have to become,” Castiel said, “to survive Hell.”

Dean said something Castiel wasn’t expecting. He was expecting Dean to walk away from him, but instead Dean looked Castiel in the eye challengingly and said, “Tell me.”

“You won’t forgive me,” Castiel warned him slowly, “when I tell you. You won’t want me to stick around, knowing what I am capable of.”

“I want to know what the hell just happened in there,” Dean told him bluntly, his eyes burning bright with what, if Castiel hadn’t known him better, he would have thought were tears. Dean looked him right in the eye and said, “You’ve been lying again and again since you got back, and I think it’s about time you start from the beginning.”

“You’ll never forgive me,” Castiel said.

“I’ll hate you more,” Dean told him steadily, “if you keep lying to me.”

And that decided it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Class is gaining in intensity as exams draw nearer and this isn't as edited as I would have liked for it to be. I'm sorry about that.
> 
> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com


	11. Fragile Broken Things

Castiel paced the floor of Bobby’s kitchen anxiously, trying not to be hyperaware of his enraptured audience watching his every move. He wondered if they were waiting for him to speak, or waiting for him to explode. His fingers twitched, but the blood was gone, and the pain he felt had nothing to do with a physical wound, and Castiel pressed hard on one of the stitches on his hands, so hard he was sure the fragile stitches were going to snap, but he kept at it, breathing raggedly. He shook his head and looked to where they were sitting at the table, all of them with alcohol in front of them, Castiel’s mouth already stinging from a Vodka shot. Dean was slumped, his arms on the table, half of his glass of whiskey already missing.

Castiel laughed sourly and began with, “Every day, I think about what it’s like down there. I think about how time is different—I remember, when I found out the date back on the surface, I was horrified that it had only been four months, because it felt like it should have been years, decades, maybe a goddamn century, it had been so long. Give or take a few months, I spent forty years on Alastair’s Rack. Forty years of torture like nothing you could ever believe. Even then, it felt like it should have been longer. _God_ is forty years a long time to live.

“I assume Bobby knows all about what I told you two about how the souls of demon deals get sent down to the Rack—I’m sure you told him your version about the torture, about Alastair. I—I wish there was a way to explain—to tell you about what happened—but it’s—”

Castiel ran an anxious hand over his face, his left hand squeezing unconsciously. He fought enough evil and met enough scarred hunters to know what PTSD looked like, and he hated himself for that tick, for that little show of weakness. He saw Bobby see it, his eyes shaded, allowing nothing through, and Castiel couldn’t help but to feel like he was about to let the closest thing he had for a father down.

“I can’t talk about the torture,” Castiel told them slowly. “Not because it’s too painful or something but because—it is all a blur of screaming and blood and—I can’t even begin to explain to you the monstrous things that they did to me. None of it was human. None of it was possible. It was bloody, and it was terrible, and—and it went on for thirty years. Thirty out of forty years. I should have been able to last longer, but I was too weak to hold on. I—I thought that was the worst they could do to me, that anything that came after would be bearable.”

Castiel laughed sourly, reaching out and yanking the Vodka bottle off of the table, catching the flabbergasted look on Dean’s face before Castiel brought the bottle to his lips and downed burning mouthfuls before slamming it back onto the table, rubbing his face harshly.

“Well,” Castiel replied, his voice rough with self-loathing, “I was wrong.

“Every day, after I had been tortured and magically put back together again, Alastair would come in to see me. He would stand over me and tell me that it would all go away, all of the pain and torture, if I accepted his offer. He—he would take me off of the Rack, if I put souls on; if I started torturing them, if I became his apprentice. For thirty years, I told him to shove his offer up his ass. And then they broke me.”

Castiel slammed his fist down hard on the counter. His stitches split, and Castiel took a deep breath, pushing away the soft relief that came with the feeling of his blood hitting the air, where it stung the place the skin was separated. Dean moved like he was going to get up and fix it, but Castiel just shook his head, holding out his uninjured hand, and Dean stayed where he was, his eyes on Castiel distressed, but Castiel looked away because he knew he wouldn’t be able to bear the way Dean was going to look at him when he told him the rest, everything he had never wanted to share to another soul, and he felt a bit of comfort in the blood running down his arm, the wound stinging.

“I fucking gave in,” Castiel growled, gripping at his hair hard, crazed with his anger and self-hatred, wishing any pain on his plane would be enough for what he deserved. “I deserved to burn for centuries for all of the things that I have done, but I ducked out. Alastair came in and I told him that I would do it, and the pain went away and I was relieved. I got off the Rack, and then I turned on so many innocent people who couldn’t control being there anymore than I could—and they didn’t get the offer I did. I dug into men, women, all ages, all nationalities, and I watched them bleed and I watched them scream, and I fucking ripped them apart—and I _liked_ it. I liked it _a lot_. And that’s not even the most fucked up part of it.”

Sam was green. Bobby was controlled, but Castiel could see the pull of the muscles on his face trying too hard to keep it that way. He couldn’t even think about looking at Dean.

“When I was in Hell, I started to lose it. Bad. Those last ten years are nearly lost. I think I understand why now—souls in Hell, they deteriorate, and they fall apart until they are consumed by it, and they become demons. It hit me too soon, probably because of everything I knew, and how much I hated myself for all of my mistakes. I lost it so badly that hurting other people didn’t even do much for me anymore. It wasn’t enough. It didn’t take more than a year of being Alastair’s apprentice before cutting up other people couldn’t do it for me, and I was turning the knife on myself.”

He heard the sound of Dean’s breath catch. Castiel just chugged three more mouthfuls of Vodka before setting the bottle down again, the world spinning. He gripped the back of a chair to keep himself anchored. He looked down at his hands, grinning when he remembered the cut on the back of his hand, and he tapped his finger against it.

“It made these wounds,” Castiel slurred, “look like child’s play.”

Castiel went to take a step away from the chair and ended up stumbling, and his back hit the counter hard. He saw the blurred figure that had to be Dean twitch, but Castiel just laughed at the pain, grinning, feeling like he was a whole new person. He felt like he was losing control.

He felt like he had in Hell.

“The bad thing about all of that,” Castiel hiccupped, grinning, “is that none of God’s little angels can fix it, I think. Anna brought me back, and she fixed up my body, but I don’t think there’s anything she can do to help my soul, because I feel it. I feel the darkness that I felt when I was torturing, can feel it pulsing with my heartbeat, itching to get out. I’m ready to hide it forever—but it’s fucking torture to know that I will always have a demon inside of me. And that demon is me. How fucked is that?”

The world was spinning. It felt like he was about to fall off the edge, and he would be lost forever.

“I tried so hard to be normal, to fight it,” Castiel kept speaking, not remembering if there was someone listening and not caring, his eyes heavy. “It seemed doable, at first. Easy. But now I’m afraid I’m going to fall right back into it. And I don’t want to. I don’t want to be that version of me. I don’t think it’s really my choice anymore.”

Castiel pointed blindly at where he thought Sam was.

“See what I mean, Sam?” Castiel slurred badly. “This was what I meant—I’m not worth anything. If God was saving anyone, it wasn’t me.”

“Cas, buddy, I think you should sit down,” Sam’s voice told him, somewhere far away, echoing through his ears like there was a tunnel between them, and Castiel shook his head at him, swaying.

“You might as well kill me,” Castiel announced, “because I’m no better than the monsters you hunt.”

He found the bruises later from when he hit the hard linoleum when he passed out.

*

When he woke up, he was in the panic room.

He couldn’t even find it in himself to be offended. The way he had acted yesterday— _yesterday?_ —was suspicious at best, terrifyingly unexpected in all contexts. He couldn’t imagine what they must have thought when they watched him drink like that, when they heard the terrible things he had to share about what happened to him in Hell. He couldn’t wipe away the memory of Dean’s face when Castiel told them he thought he was still demonic, if at least a little bit, all in his soul, all to stay.

So no. He couldn’t blame them for taking the precaution. He only wished they would have left him with a glass of water, or maybe a toothbrush.

Castiel groaned as he heaved himself off of the cot, planting his feet soundly on the ground, feeling for a moment like he was on a boat in the middle of a tempest before he managed to gain his equilibrium back, and he made his way to the doorway. He hesitated a moment before he stepped over the threshold, feeling a sudden extraordinary relief flow through him when he could escape the Devil’s trap.

He would never admit to anyone, not even to himself, that he suddenly stopped feeling ill the moment he was past the warding.

He would pretend like he was fine, the way he always had.

Castiel stumbled up into Bobby’s home, quietly creeping through the living room, but there was no one to be seen. It was dark, beyond dusk—a glance at the clock over the oven told him that it was four o’clock, and Castiel realized with a shock that meant he had either slept a very few hours or much too many. He got himself a glass of water and chugged it before he made his way out the back door, no longer caring about threats or danger as he made sure the door shut silently behind him before wandering in between the rows of cars, looking up.

The sky was dark. There were stars, but not as many as there would be if they went a couple of miles outside of the city, out into where it was really farm country. Even here, isolated at Bobby’s, it was in the middle of a population of people. It was still filled with light and humanity.

Castiel sat on the hood of one of the broken cars, leaning back into the windshield as he looked up at the inky black of the sky, studying the random pinpricks of stars splattered across the canvas like Dean’s freckles on his cheekbones, and a ghost of a smile tugged at Castiel’s lips at the thought.

He wasn’t sure how long he sat out there for. Long enough that the sky began to grow lighter, nearly unperceptively so, just enough for the stars to start fading away. Castiel just looked up at the void, thinking about Hell and about Heaven, thinking about how they were destined to collide and how he had a feeling he would be standing in the middle of it, and he thought about his friends, about Dean, and what their reactions would be of him in the morning.

He thought a lot about Dean, the same way he always thought about him since the moment they met. He wondered where this left them, if what little progress they had made in their relationship was set back because of the person Castiel had become. He wondered about, if Dean were to accept him, how long he would be able to before Castiel did something of his new hellish nature and Dean had to walk away. Castiel wondered what Dean’s role in this power play between Heaven and Hell might be, because it’s always the Winchesters in the middle of it all, and he didn’t fully hate the thought of fighting for what he believed in with Dean soundly at his side.

He was so busy thinking about him that he didn’t notice the real deal walk over to him until Dean was sliding onto the hood of the same car, lounging next to Castiel, his side pressed against his. Castiel looked over at him, almost surprised that he would want to be so close, but Dean was looking up at the sky, his hands resting peacefully on his stomach, rising up and down with every breath he took.

“I haven’t been able to sleep all night,” Dean confessed casually, still looking to the stars. “You’ve been out for a day, and I haven’t slept—first night because I couldn’t stop thinking about what you said, and the second because I couldn’t stop thinking that you wouldn’t wake up. I keep thinking, but I’m still stuck on one thing.” Dean looked at him, his eyes tearing him apart, and he asked, “Do you really think that you’re a monster?”

And Castiel didn’t hesitate before he answered, “Yes.”

Dean shook his head, closing his eyes. “You couldn’t be more wrong about that. Thirty years of torture—Cas, it’s fucking _saintly_ that you lasted that long without breaking. Prisoners of War sometimes can’t even last a year, and that’s not Hell. It may feel like it, but it’s not, not in the same way. And no matter how dark you got, no matter how much you started to lose yourself, it doesn’t matter, because you’re still _you_. You’re right here in front of me and you are the same Cas you’ve always been. And to have gone through the things you’ve gone through and for me to be able to say that—that says more about you than I think you even realize.”

“I’ll never forgive myself for what I did in Hell.”

“Okay,” Dean said, “but I do. I forgive you. Just so you know.”

And Castiel didn’t know which of them moved first, but they were kissing, and Castiel’s heart was on fire because he never believed they would ever be able to come back to this. He never let himself imagine that Dean would accept his faults, forget his terrible behavior, and move on as simple as that. Because Dean wasn’t the type for words—Castiel never expected him to come out and lay it all out in front of him like that, because it was so uncharacteristic of him. Dean strived to keep it all in, to solely shoulder all of his blame and guilt and shame. To see him share like that, to see him set Castiel free without a moment of hesitation, to be back in a tangle of lips and tongue and heat—it was something amazing. Something extraordinary.

It set his world on fire.

Castiel always knew he loved Dean, but the slow burn that rolled underneath of his skin, like the shadow of a wildfire, was new. When Dean ran his hands through his hair, he didn’t expect the rush like wind in his ears, and when he felt the low rumble of a moan in Dean’s chest, he didn’t know the feeling of desire that was suddenly so strong that he couldn’t breathe. Castiel gasped as he pulled away, feeling like he had been hit in the chest hard with the best kind of sledgehammer, and Dean blinked at him, looking dazed, like Castiel had somehow gotten him to forget his own name.

This was more than love. This was something that Castiel knew nothing about, and the thought of what it could possibly be terrified him.

No. This was so much more than love.

This was devotion. This was loyalty. This was forever.

Castiel would never be able to heal from any scars that Dean Winchester would leave on his heart. From that moment forward, he was gone. He was shattered. He was Dean’s, and Dean was just sitting there looking at him, having no idea how far this would go, having no idea how far it had gone already.

Castiel surprised himself with his own forwardness when he asked, “What is this, Dean? What are we?”

Dean looked taken aback for a moment before that telltale smirk flickered across his face, and he turned it on Castiel with a blaze that could only be trumped by the sun, now peaking over the horizon. “I don’t know what we are, exactly,” he told Castiel slowly, carefully, his eyes wicked, “but I sure as hell hope this is permanent.”

The sound Castiel made in response to that was not only inhuman, but it was also incredibly embarrassing. But Dean just laughed loudly before pulling Castiel off of the car and ushering him back inside, telling him that he needed to eat something before he withered away, and Castiel followed him blindly, because it was the way it always was with Dean Winchester, and the way it always will be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This will be edited at a later date.
> 
> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> x Slang


	12. On the Head of a Pin

“Dean, no one wants to watch this,” Sam told his brother in irritation, jamming his finger at the television set, where that terrible doctor soap opera Dean loved to marathon was playing. Sam had about enough of the program, and he wasn’t afraid to show it—Castiel was hovering at the edge of the action, biting back a laugh as he watched the brothers bicker, Dean scowling as he watched the events on the show, not looking away even to flip the bird at his little brother.

“ _I_ want to watch this,” Dean argued, his eyes narrowing. “Cas?”

“Don’t drag me into this,” Castiel cautioned him, shaking his head. “I’m staying far away from this argument. You’re on your own.”

Dean looked away then to throw him a look that was obviously insulted and betrayed, and Sam shot Castiel a grin, probably knowing as well as they all did that Castiel’s vote would be the one with the most weight, and Sam was glad he at least wasn’t completely defeated. Castiel rolled his eyes at the brothers and slumped deeper into his chair, turning back to Sam’s laptop, where he had been looking for a hunt for the last couple of hours.

Dean and Castiel hadn’t let Sam know about the change of their relationship—how the flirting was gaining meaning, how the looks meant something more, how Dean had a tendency to locate Castiel the moment he was alone and push him against the nearest object and make out with him—but Sam wasn’t an idiot. Castiel was pretty sure that Sam was intuitive enough to know that something had changed since they left Bobby’s, deciding they needed to get back to work and away from tiptoeing around each other. Dean and Castiel weren’t about to sit Sam down and have a talk, and Castiel was pretty sure Sam was cool with it as long as he didn’t see anything outside eyes had no right to see.

They coexisted for a slow passing of time, none of them wanting to bring up the breakdown Castiel had at the Singer house, and none of them seemed to care much about it. Castiel knew they were worried for him, but knowing that they weren’t nearly as worried about what he might _do_ was reassurance enough.

It had been too long a time with silence. Ten days felt like a millennium with the unknown hanging over their heads. Castiel should have known that, eventually, the angels were going to have questions.

Anna appeared unannounced at the table across from Castiel. He didn’t even notice until she spoke. “I have a job for you.”

Castiel nearly fell backwards off the chair. Dean and Sam shocked away, Sam reaching for the gun at his back, Dean moving as if to dive for his gun or knife under the pillow. They stopped when they spotted Anna, knowing that their weapons wouldn’t be able to hurt her, and the frosty cold expression on Dean’s face made Castiel feel the whiplash of the stare he was burning into Anna’s skin. Anna hooked one eyebrow up at him in amusement before turning back to Castiel, not even bothering to make her smile look even a little real.

It took Castiel a moment to remember she had spoken to him, and he scowled when he remembered. “A job?” he demanded. “Like, a hunting job?”

“Not exactly, but it’s still something that you know a lot about,” Anna told him cryptically, looking into his eyes, and Castiel didn’t like what he saw. He leaned away from her, not replying. “Don’t ignore me, Castiel. We raised you out of Hell to help us serve our purposes.”

“I’m not your pet that will sit, stay, and roll over for you,” Castiel snapped at her, his tone venomous. “I’m not going anywhere unless you tell me why, whether I serve you or not.”

“I could make you,” she offered lightly.

“You could try.”

Her eyes flitted to where Sam and Dean were standing defensively, weapons in their hands, and she sighed. She pushed herself onto her feet and walked to the middle of the room, crossing her arms and pouting as she turned back to face them, and Castiel slowly pushed himself out of his own chair, so sure that this was all going to her plan that it was making him feel uncomfortable.

“Seven angels have been murdered,” Anna told them, cutting right to the point. “All of them have been from my garrison. The last one was killed last night—you read the story on the news website already.”

Dean cut Castiel a sharp look, and Castiel offered a lame sheepish turn of his lips in response before telling him, “I didn’t want to get hooked into angel problems.”

“Well, you’re already hooked into it,” Anna announced. “I need your help.”

“Demons,” Castiel answered, shrugging. “How are they doing it?”

“We don’t know.” Anna stepped forward. “We can handle the demons, Castiel. That isn’t the problem. The problem lies with Alastair.”

His name sent the entire room icy cold. Castiel’s fingers twitched like they wanted to reach out and hit something, but he somehow managed to keep himself detached, calm, like a man in the middle of a warzone with everything to lose. He looked at Anna for a moment, not saying anything. “You’ve got him all tied up somewhere—why don’t you just torture it out of him?” He saw Anna’s face change, just slightly. “Oh, I see. You are, and it’s not working. Yeah, that tends to happen when you’re up against a guy with a black belt in the art. You guys must be way out of your league.”

“And that’s why I’ve come to his student,” Anna said. “You’re the best interrogator we’ve got.”

Castiel’s face fell. “You can’t ask me to do this, Anna.”

“I can,” Anna whispered, “and I just did.”

“I won’t do it.”

“That’s too bad,” Anna replied dryly, “seeing as you had so much of a choice in the matter to begin with.”

Castiel saw her move, knew what she was going to do, and he barely managed to bark out a “No!” before she reached forward and grabbed his arm, right on the faded burn, and she tugged him through the air.

It lasted less then a second. Less of a second of flashing sounds and lights and the beating of wings before Castiel was on the ground again, feeling like he left his stomach back at the motel, and he wobbled slightly on his feet. Anna was standing in front of him, her hands clasped solemnly, and Uriel was standing at her side, watching Castiel struggle with his bearings with way too much sadistic enjoyment. Castiel looked to Anna when he felt grounded again, his gaze icy and angry, and she just nodded toward the door to his left. He reluctantly took two paces over to it, glancing through the small window at eye-level into the room.

Alastair was in the middle of the room, in the middle of a large Devil’s trap that didn’t look like one Castiel had ever done, but he could see the symbols and he knew them to be Enochian. Alastair was chained onto a giant hexacle, his head bowed, his lips moving as if he was speaking to himself. Castiel recalled that Alastair was always whistling or humming whenever he would torture souls, and his skin felt like static as he thought about the feel of Alastair’s knife digging into his flesh.

“The Devil’s trap is old Enochian,” Anna informed him as if he couldn’t read it himself. “He’s bound completely.”

“Fascinating,” Castiel drawled sardonically, turning around and pacing to the other side of the room, past the angels watching him. “Where’s the door?”

“Where are you going?”

“I’m hitchhiking back to Cheyenne, thank you very much,” Castiel sent over his shoulder, reaching his hand out to grab the doorknob.

The door suddenly disappeared. Just, poof, gone. Castiel whirled around to find Uriel towering over him, his scowl enough to destroy mountains.

“Angels are dying, boy,” Uriel growled.

“Looks like everyone is dying these days,” Castiel shot back angrily, clenching his teeth together hard. “I get it—you’re all powerful, you’ve got Heaven on your side, you’ll throw me in Hell if I don’t obey. I got it. But you can’t make me do this. Not this.”

“I know it’s too much to ask,” Anna offered him, stepping up to Uriel’s side, and Castiel saw the first flash of pity on her face for the night, and he was beginning to wonder if maybe she was more on his side than anyone else she worked with was. “But, Castiel, we have to ask it. You understand.”

“I want to speak to Anna alone,” Castiel said, casting Uriel a hard glance. Uriel rolled his eyes but disappeared dutifully, and the tension he brought with him cleared the air to the point that Castiel almost felt his head start spinning. He turned his gaze on Anna, who was watching him carefully, chewing her lip. The move was so human that he almost couldn’t believe that she was some kind of warrior angel leader of the man upstairs’. “What’s going on, Anna?”

“I don’t know,” she told him honestly, her shoulders slumping in defeat. “Heaven has never seen a betrayal quite like this. My superiors are beginning to act a little anxiously.”

“You don’t want me doing this, trust me.”

“Want it, no. Absolutely not. But I have been told that we need it.”

Castiel looked at her for a long beat, and she looked back, just as determined, just as worried, just as sickly. Castiel took a deep breath before he whispered to her, “If you ask me to open that door and walk through it, you’re not going to like what comes out.”

She closed her eyes. She had to know about the inner demon growing inside of him, this darkness that he couldn’t control. She was an angel, for God’s sake—she had to be able to see it. She knew what was at stake if she let Castiel sink back into the person he had been—she knew the humanity would leak through his fingers, that he wouldn’t be able to get it back. She knew what he personally had to lose—and she was going to make him do it anyway.

“For what it’s worth,” she murmured, her eyes still closed, “I would give anything not to have you do this.”

Castiel turned away so she wouldn’t be able to see his face when she opened her eyes, because he didn’t know what she would see. He wasn’t sure if she would see him breaking, or if she would see the stoic mask of a man who had accepted he was about to lose it all. He didn’t want her to see either—he wanted to pretend like it wouldn’t matter, that the darkness that followed him out of the room wasn’t going to be enough to swallow him whole, when he knew and _she_ knew that he could barely handle it now.

Castiel took a deep breath, but it didn’t feel like he was breathing at all. It felt worse than drowning. It felt worse than a hellhound’s claws digging into his chest.

“I’ll do it,” Castiel said.

“I’m sorry,” Anna told him, but it was too little too late, and neither of them tried to pretend otherwise.

*

Castiel’s hands were gripping the cart so tightly that he thought the metal would cut through his hands, but still he clutched harder, hoping to break the skin, looking for a worthy distraction. Alastair was humming, and he looked up when Castiel kicked the door open, and his mouth curved into a sinister grin as Castiel defiantly pushed the cart toward Alastair’s Enochian prison, his eyes trained determinedly in front of him. The charge in the room felt like static electricity, but it was sparked with nothing more than the tension of Castiel’s own limbs, of Alastair’s own cunning. Castiel stared too hard at his instruments given to him by the angels, working too hard to prepare the first method of his attack, his hands shaking only slightly.

Alastair’s humming gave way to a soft song under his breath, his tone amused as he filled the air with, “Heaven, I’m in heaven, and my heart beats so that I can hardly speak. I seem to find the happiness I seek when we’re out together, dancing cheek to cheek . . .”

The song made Castiel’s skin cold, but he continued to temporarily ignore him, twirling a knife in between his fingers, getting used to the weight, getting used to the thrill of excitement thrumming in his chest.

Alastair’s singing turned into laughter suddenly, like he had been holding it back but he couldn’t possibly anymore. He suddenly sobered when Castiel turned to look at him, the demon’s eyes shining with venom.

“I’m sorry,” Alastair grated, barely containing his entertainment at the sight of seeing Castiel standing before him with a knife, losing control. “This is a very serious, very emotional situation for you. I shouldn’t laugh, it’s just that—I mean, are they serious? They sent _you_ to torture me?”

“You got one chance,” Castiel told Alastair, his voice hard. “One. Tell me who’s killing the angels. I want a name.”

“You think I’ll see all your scary toys and spill my guts?”

Castiel smiled patiently, cruelly. “Oh, you’ll be spilling your guts one way or the other. I just didn’t want to ruin my shoes.”

“Of course,” Alastair said, nodding from where he was bound in the chains, nearly vibrating with glee as he played his game, and Castiel figured he was more likely to ruin his shoes with his own vomit than Alastair’s blood with the way he couldn’t stop shaking, with the way his heart felt like it was about to beat out of his chest.

“Answer my question,” Castiel commanded.

“Or what?” Alastair taunted, simpering. “You’ll work me over? But then, maybe you don’t want to. Maybe you’re scared to. Don’t want a repeat of the barn, do we?”

“I’m here, aren’t I?”

“Not entirely.” Alastair leaned closer to Castiel, and even though he was nowhere near him, Castiel felt like Alastair was up in his face when he smirked at him, when he continued, “You left part of yourself back in the Pit. Let’s see if we can get the two of you back together again, shall we?”

“You’re gonna be disappointed,” Castiel told him, but neither of them believed him. Castiel turned back to the cart, nearly knocking over a jar of holy water as he rummaged for courage that he could not find, and he felt Alastair’s eyes on his back, burning into him.

“You have not disappointed me so far,” Alastair admitted in a coo. “Come on. You gotta want a little payback for everything I did to you, for all the pokes and prods. Huh?”

Castiel didn’t let his rage show on his face. He wouldn’t show Alastair he was right. But even Alastair didn’t have to see it on Castiel’s face to know he was.

“No?” the demon asked, sounding like he was about to laugh. “Hmm. Then would you like to hear a couple of stories that might get under your skin? I’m sure you’ve heard of John Winchester, seeing as you’re giving the sex-eyes to his son?”

Castiel’s mask slipped. He stared at Alastair, surprised, pausing, and Alastair looked entirely pleased that he had managed to bring down Castiel’s walls, if even temporarily. Alastair hummed to himself, analyzing Castiel’s slip in composure, leaning back into his prison, considering what to say next to hit just the right buttons.

“I had your boyfriend’s pop on my Rack for close to a century,” Alastair announced proudly, smiling.

“You can’t stall me forever,” Castiel told him, hoping that would make him change the subject.

“John Winchester,” Alastair sung happily. “Made a good name for himself. A hundred years. After each session, I’d make him the same offer I made you. I’d put down my blade if he picked one up.”

“Just give me the demon’s name, Alastair.”

“But he said nein, nein, nein—every single time. Oh, damned if I couldn’t break the man.”

Castiel shrugged out of his jacket, slinging it over the cart handle as Alastair continued to speak, clutching his hands into fists in the hopes of hiding that they were starting to shake, imagining Dean’s face if he was here, imagining how Castiel knowing this information would have the ability to break apart every small thing the two had built together for each other, knowing that this would send all of it tumbling down.

“I pulled out all the stops,” Alastair continued conversationally, “but John, he was, well, made of something unique. The stuff of heroes. And then came Castiel Novak, his son’s best friend and hunting partner, the person that watched Dean Winchester’s back—John’s little toy soldier only ran with the best, right? I thought I would be up against a hero.”

Castiel grabbed at a bottle of whiskey Anna had tucked into the corner of the cart, trying to focus on the burn of the liquid down his throat, unable to hide that he was shaking anymore, and he knew Alastair was going to run with it, knew that he would mow him down if he let him. And Castiel didn’t have as much of a fight in him than he thought he did.

Alastair sighed. “But this hero—no. He broke in thirty. This demon hunter with nerves of steel couldn’t handle the pain of the knife the moment it got worse, and he tapped out. It’s sad, really, if you think about it. I had so many expectations for you, so many hopes of a challenge, and you didn’t last nearly as long as I hoped. I was a little disappointed, to be honest, but you made up for it for what you did next.”

Castiel fumbled for a needle and filled it from the tub of holy water, the rosary bobbing at the surface. Castiel rolled his shoulders as he turned to face Alastair, rolling his sleeves up with one hand.

Alastair was grinning maniacally, excitedly. “Now we’re getting somewhere,” he purred. “But holy water? Come on. Grasshopper, you’re gonna have to get creative to impress me.”

“You know something, Alastair?” Castiel asked loudly as he swaggered closer to the demon, his whole posture casual and predatory all at once. “I could still dream, even in Hell. And over and over and over, you know what I dreamt?” Castiel smiled sadistically. “I dreamt of this moment. And believe me, I got a few ideas.”

Alastair’s face finally filled with nervousness as Castiel stepped to him, still smiling, and he sprayed a little water from the needle, watching it. He looked back up at the demon, and smiled pleasantly.

“Let’s get started,” Castiel announced.

Alastair screamed when the water entered his veins, and Castiel almost expected the maniac to start laughing again, to adapt to the pain as he had before in the barn, but nothing came. Castiel stepped back to watch as Alastair threw himself against his restraints, howling, and Castiel got a sick bolt of excitement as he watched him, wanting so badly to smile and laugh and to feel the pleasure of causing this pain in his bones, but he still had enough restraint left that he wasn’t losing himself. He watched Alastair curse and cough as he leaned forward into the chains, gasping for air.

“Oh, man, ooh,” Alastair coughed, having the decency to look hesitant.

“Let me know if you want some more,” Castiel offered with fake hospitality and kindness. “There’s plenty to go.”

“Go directly to Hell. Do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars,” Alastair responded unkindly, his eyes flashing.

Castiel smiled.

Alastair’s eyes followed him worriedly as Castiel ducked back to the cart with all of his torture instruments, and he pulled out Ruby’s knife, which he didn’t want to ask how Anna was able to pick-pocket a Winchester to bring it here, and he grabbed for a tub of holy water. The knife flashed in the weak warehouse light, catching Alastair’s attention, and he let out a choked chuckle.

“There’s that little pig-poker,” he said. “I wondered where it went.”

Castiel grabbed a ladle and poured some of the water over the blade, letting it soak for a moment. Alastair continued to seethe with barely-contained hatred and fear from his prison.

“Do you really think this is going to fix you? Give you _closure_?” Alastair snarled, trying to get a rise from him. “That is sad. That’s really sad. _Sad, sad_.”

Castiel crossed to Alastair and stared for a moment before bringing the knife forward and stabbing Alastair harshly in the shoulder. A loud sizzling sound filled the room, and Alastair hissed a hard breath through his clenched teeth, his eyes defiantly staring down Castiel’s.

“I carved you into a new animal, Clarence,” Alastair murmured to him softly, almost intimately in the closeness. “There’s no going back from there, Grasshopper.”

“Maybe you’re right,” Castiel admitted, knowing that Alastair was, “but now it’s my turn.”

“No!” Alastair howled, trying to jerk away, but there was nowhere to go.

And Castiel gave into his temptation.

He carved the knife into Alastair, in swirling patterns, digging it deeper when he didn’t like the muttered screams through Alastair’s clenched lips, listening to the demon as he howled and shrieked from pain as the holy water and the magic knife mingled the pain into his blood, a feeling that must have been like being torn apart, and Castiel lost himself a little. He tore a little too much, dug a little too deep. He lost track of how much time had gone by before he snapped back into himself, when Alastair couldn’t hold himself up anymore and was relying on the chains. The demon was breathing heavily, harshly, and his blood was pooling on the ground. The slash marks were all over his arms and neck and torso, and Alastair’s head was tilted upward, looking at the sky, like not looking at Castiel would heal him.

Castiel stopped and took a step back. Immediately, Alastair’s head fell forward, his chin against his bloodied chest, and he laughed.

“Now, it’s your professionalism that I respect,” Alastair told Castiel approvingly.

Castiel turned his head away from Alastair, stepping back another step, not sure if the disgust churning in his stomach was over his lapse of control or Alastair’s ability to laugh through this kind of pain, to hold firm despite it all. He watched Alastair spit out a mouthful of blood and didn’t make a conscious decision to grab one of the jugs of holy water before he turned and splashed it in Alastair’s face, and Alastair’s skin sizzled and he gargled, drowning in it, and Castiel watched with eyes that didn’t even care anymore, knowing that this one demon had the ability to tear apart his life, and that he had already done so. He only had to _speak_ , and Alastair had torn it all down. And it made Castiel mad. It made him want to have more revenge than he already did.

“Who’s murdering the angels?” Castiel asked the demon in a low, dangerous, measured voice.

Alastair looked up at Castiel, looked him straight in the eye, and smiled.

Castiel dove forward with more water and forced it down Alastair’s throat until he was choking on it. Then he splashed it on Alastair’s open wounds, and the coughs of drowning turned to screams of agony, and the sound felt like heroin in Castiel’s veins. He went back to his cart, rummaging unevenly for his next idea, unable to keep his hands steady in his newfound fix. Alastair spit out more blood from his prison, and Castiel found the container of salt.

“You have no idea how bad it really was, and what you really did for us,” Alastair told Castiel desperately, like he wanted him to hear this, but Castiel wasn’t sure he wanted to hear too much talking right now.

“Shut up,” he whispered, focusing on what he was doing.

“The whole bloody thing, Castiel,” Alastair continued just as desperately, and Castiel paused, never hearing a demon sound so weak and offering of information, Alastair’s tone almost wondrous, almost . . . proud. “The whole thing—the reason why Lilith wanted you there in the first place—”

“Well, then, I’ll just have to make you shut up,” Castiel said, starting forward with the salt.

“Lilith really,” Alastair tried to say, but Castiel was already pouring the salt down the demon’s throat, and his screams were muffled and pained.

Castiel watched Alastair struggle with the salt for a few minutes, feeling energized, and Alastair spat up more blood before he groaned.

“Something caught in my throat,” Alastair announced, grimacing. “I think it’s my throat.”

“Well, strap in, ’cause I’m just _starting_ to have fun,” Castiel told him cheerily, twirling Ruby’s knife.

Alastair coughed again before his desperate tone returned as he called to Castiel, “It was supposed to be John Winchester. _He_ was supposed to bring it on. But, in the end, it was you. We were wrong.”

Castiel stopped. His stomach suddenly dropped. Everything stood still, and he couldn’t breathe.

“ _What_ did I bring on?” he demanded.

Alastair laughed shakily and said, “Oh, every night, the same offer, remember? Same as heroic Papa Winchester. And finally you’re the one that said, ‘Sign me up.’ Oh, the first time you picked up my razor, the first time you sliced into that weeping bitch...”

Castiel knew.

Somehow, right then and there, he _knew_.

But he still felt like he was going to scream when Alastair leaned forward and cooed:

“That was the first seal.”

And even if he knew it, somewhere deep inside of himself, even if the horror was paralyzing and he felt like he was about to choke on his own blood, Castiel said, “You’re lying.”

“And it is written,” Alastair purred, sounding as though he was quoting something, his eyes eager and proud and cruel, “that the first seal shall be broken when a righteous man sheds blood in Hell. As he breaks, so shall it break.”

Castiel turned away, turning his back to Alastair, using the cart as something to hold onto, to keep him up. His knees were shaking, and he thought he was going to be sick, but he couldn’t move from this spot, right here. He couldn’t move and couldn’t think and could only feel the debilitating horror spreading through his veins with every heartbeat, burning like acid.

“Believe me, son,” Alastair cooed, “I wouldn’t lie about this. It’s kind of a religious sort of thing with me.”

Castiel knew that. He could tell, by Alastair’s show of emotions, by the way every event in Hell had happened, by the demonic feeling in his chest of having knocked over a domino that was what ultimately began the end of the world. He somehow knew it would be bigger than him from the moment he made the demon deal to get Sam back—somewhere, in the back of his mind and deep in his chest, Castiel had known that this would go wrong.

But he never expected this.

He reached forward numbly, his hand curling around the handle of Ruby’s knife, a new desire pulsing through him. His fingers tightened around it, and Castiel said slowly, loudly, his voice shaking slightly, “No. I don’t think you are lying. But even if the demons do win—you won’t be there to see it.”

Castiel turned around, only to find Alastair right behind him, freed from his binding, his eyes wild.

“You should talk to your plumber about the pipes,” Alastair said, and Castiel was suddenly flying across the room, slamming against the concrete wall hard, hearing something crack. He groaned, his fingers letting go of the knife, and he slammed hard into the ground, coughing up blood. Alastair crossed the room and grinned down at Castiel before he kicked him in the head, hard, and Castiel flattened on the ground again, disoriented, to the sound of Alastair’s laughter.

Alastair leaned down and picked up Castiel by his shirtfront, dragging him to the hexacle, where he shoved him against it hard, and Castiel felt the hard, sharp pain of whatever had cracked before flare up his back, nearly paralyzing him, making white sparks appear in his vision. Alastair took the opportunity of Castiel’s pain to slam punches into his head again, and again, and again, so many times that Castiel couldn’t even keep count, couldn’t think properly, only slumped and allowed them to come, blood dripping from his mouth. He could barely breathe through the pain as Alastair slammed him back against the hexacle again, the demon’s eyes bright with humor as he grinned down at Castiel, energized, reverent, and sadistic, and Castiel knew there was only one way this would end.

He almost didn’t even care if Alastair killed him. He had one thought roll through his head, in one single moment, just one name, just one, but, for once, even that wasn’t enough.

“You got a lot to learn, boy,” Alastair growled through his teeth, grinning. “So I’ll see you back in class bright and early Monday morning.”

Castiel knew this would be the death blow, and he braced himself for it the best he could, resigned to it, but Alastair suddenly turned around, and Castiel barely made out the image of Anna standing behind the demon with Ruby’s knife before Alastair dropped Castiel, and he was unable to hold himself up, so he slumped unresponsively onto the floor, unmoving, only able to see through a blurring vision as Anna stabbed Alastair in the chest with the knife. They all watched as there was a spark, a burst of light, but even Castiel’s muddled, dying brain knew that it wasn’t right.

“Well, almost,” Alastair commented easily, laughing. “Looks like God is on my side today.”

Alastair tugged the knife out of his chest and charged Anna, and Castiel’s eyes felt like they were crossing, and it was hard to keep his eyes open, and he started losing track of it all, barely hearing Alastair as he growled, “You’re like roaches, you celestials. Now, I really wish I knew how to kill you—but all I can do is send you back to Heaven.”

Alastair was chanting. Anna was struggling. Castiel knew this was the time to fight, but all he felt was that familiar dark, that familiar numb of death, and it was dragging him under like waves against a shore, pulling him into the depths. He felt his breaths slowing, felt the world slowing down, and his eyes couldn’t stay open anymore.

Castiel heard the sound of a door slamming open, and he heard Dean’s desperate scream of his name, the nickname Dean had given him so long ago, but it was too late, and Castiel’s eyes closed, and he slumped to the ground as his heart stopped beating.

He died with the sound of Dean’s voice echoing through him like a heartbeat, and that was a nice thought. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com


	13. White Light

He knew it wasn’t Hell before he even knew he was dead.

Castiel’s eyes opened.

He didn’t know why, but he almost expected that romanticized white light—that he would walk into it, and he would walk through the gates of Heaven. Angels seemed like they would be the melodramatic type, so he expected that there would be a little bit of a production if he was as special as they made him sound like he was, but Castiel was hit hard with whiplash that almost sent him stumbling when he remembered why he was special at all.

He thought about Alastair, and he thought about the apocalypse. He thought about the righteous man, and Castiel couldn’t help but to wonder if this was even Heaven at all.

Castiel had to consciously orient himself in this new place, taking deep breaths and blinking and trying not to panic when he realized he didn’t need to do any of those automatic things because he had no body he was keeping alive. He stumbled, his knees shaky, and he took a good look at the world around him, feeling oddly disoriented, like he had been shaken around like a rag doll before plopped back upright onto his feet.

He was in a meadow-like field. It was bright green with healthy grass and shrubs and wildflowers, bordered by a forest with trees healthily spaced away from each other, letting the sunshine and bright blue sky overwhelm the area with light. Castiel frowned at the brightness, his head spinning.

A laugh came from behind him and he whirled so quickly he nearly lost his balance. A young man was hovering behind him, grinning at him, his hands shoved into his pockets, his stance casual and not at all defensive. Castiel stared at him, surprised.

“Who the hell are you?” Castiel demanded. “And where am I?”

“You’re in Heaven, Castiel Novak,” the young man told him, gesturing with his hand casually around at the clearing. “You’re not in _your_ Heaven, of course, because I didn’t want you to get too cozy, but this was the best I could do on short notice. I thought Anna might have managed to save you before you got this far, but no such luck, it seems. I guess I shouldn’t expect _everything_ to be done _for_ me.”

Castiel gaped at the man, unable to understand what was happening. The young man just grinned at him—his hair was dark and combed over in a style that wouldn’t be common in Castiel’s era downstairs, and he was tall and sturdy, and something about the body type felt familiar but it felt like there was a block in Castiel’s mind, not allowing him to consider any sort of logic.

He was in Heaven. He was dead, and he was in _Heaven_.

“You didn’t answer my first question,” Castiel weakly pointed out, and the young man grinned.

“I was almost hoping I wouldn’t have to,” he explained before shrugging, “but that’s another, longer story. I’m Michael.”

It took a second.

“Not, like, _the_ Michael,” Castiel said cautiously, hesitantly, and the young man tilted his head back and laughed so loudly that Castiel heard it echo in the trees.

“I’m that one,” Michael confirmed, smiling patiently toward Castiel. “I figured you would guess, but then I realized that you wouldn’t know this form.” He gestured toward the body he was wearing, and Castiel looked at the man, not understanding, until Michael waved him off with a laugh. “That’s unimportant right now, Castiel. Things will make a lot more sense to you later.”

“I’m dead this time, right?” Castiel asked, blinking at the man, unable to wrap his head around how he was speaking directly to the angel CEO, President, and General. Michael appraised him for a moment, looking at him for a long time like he was evaluating him, before smiling.

“You’re dead, but I’m sending you back,” Michael informed him. “Hope you don’t mind. You’ve got quite a lot more work to do in that world, to be honest. Can’t have things happening all wonky, you know?”

“What?” Castiel demanded, confused.

“Sorry about this,” Michael told him honestly. “I can’t really ever talk to people like a normal human being, being who I am. And you—when I send you back, you’re not going to remember a thing.”

“Why am I still here, if you’re sending me back?” Castiel asked, head spinning.

“You’ve only been dead about thirty seconds,” Michael explained simply, humming to himself. “And I couldn’t help but to be a little curious about you. But I should probably get moving, since you’re probably giving that poor Winchester boy quite the heart attack, thinking he just had to watch you die again.”

“Dean?” Castiel asked, surprised, remembering a flash of a face.

“You forget more and more,” the angel whispered sadly, “every single time.”

“What are you talking about?” Castiel demanded, but Michael just shook his head and hooked a crooked grin on his face, looking almost careless, but Castiel could see the sobriety in his eyes.

“Time to head back to Kansas, Dorothy,” Michael teased him. “I’ve got some work for you to do still. The righteous man.”  

Michael tipped his head back and laughed like he had just told the best of all jokes.

And then Castiel forgot it all.

*

He knew it wasn’t Hell even before he came back to life.

Castiel gasped wildly, everything painful, and he heard screaming and yelling above him, but he saw nothing but blurs when his eyes flicked open just once, twice. He was only slightly aware of hands clutching at his shirt, of Anna’s voice and Dean’s voice and Sam’s voice further away. He was only slightly aware of how shallow his breathing was, how it felt like he was breathing through water, and it took a moment before the static sound in his ears gave way to intelligible noise, and Castiel heard Dean screaming, “Cas, _stay with me_!”

Castiel lost consciousness.

*

This time, when he woke up, everything was still. His head wasn’t spinning. His thoughts weren’t frantic. His heart wasn’t pounding like it had just received an electric shock. Castiel felt like he had been through the ringer, but he could remember next to nothing—he remembered Alastair, and the attack, and being confused and hearing Dean screaming, but he couldn’t really understand why it felt like he had lost valuable time somewhere between those events. Castiel didn’t even bother opening his eyes immediately, just sat there breathing easily, half wondering if he would open his eyes and he would be on the Rack and Alastair would be laughing, knowing he had been having a dream of surviving, and Castiel felt sick, wondering how he was ever going to survive it this time around.

His eyes flew open, afraid of what they may see, and it took less than a minute for him to identify everything around him as a hospital room, and he was able to breathe again, his heart rate slowing down.

He listened to the slowing beeping from the machine next to him as he blinked against the lightness in the room, his neck hurting, and it felt like Castiel had been sleeping for a long time. He was aware of Dean’s presence next to him, weight on Castiel’s hand, Dean’s head against his hip, and Castiel glanced over to find the man slumped over and sleeping against him, his hand gripping Castiel’s gently, but Dean’s hand on the bed was curled tightly, gripping the sheets so strongly that Castiel was sure it would tear in his grip if it hadn’t already.

Castiel took a deep breath, feeling a dull pain, a dull ache in every muscle in his body. He stared up at the ceiling, remembering the events in perfect clarity, but he couldn’t understand why he wasn’t reacting, why it felt like he was moving underwater.

And then it hit him like a bullet to the brain.

_The righteous man._

Castiel felt like he was going to vomit.

The apocalypse— _he_ had been the one to start it. His weakness in Hell, it was the catalyst toward all of the events, starting the breaking of the seals. It suddenly made sense—why the angels would come into Hell to rescue him, only to find themselves there too late. Castiel’s weakness was the reason why people were dying, why seals were being broken.

Lucifer was going to walk free, the angels’ forces debilitated, and it would all be Castiel’s fault.

The world was going to end because Castiel couldn’t handle Alastair’s torture.

Castiel’s hands clenched into the sheet, his jaw locking so firmly that Castiel wondered if it had been wired shut.

It was suddenly too hard to breathe.

It was entirely his fault. He was the righteous man, and he had shed blood in Hell, and his actions would ultimately lead to the destruction of the world.

If he had hated himself before—that was nothing in comparison to the loathing that was overtaking him now.

He wanted to rip out the IV, wanted to shove himself out of the bed. He wanted to walk on bruised and broken limbs, wanted to feel the pain, because he deserved every goddamned second of the real-world torture that he hadn’t been able to handle in Hell. He deserved to feel ultimate suffering before the end of the world.

Castiel looked at Dean and felt a wave of self-disgust roll through him. The last thing he deserved was to be happy. The last thing he deserved was the affection of Dean Winchester.

So Castiel tugged his hand out from under Dean’s, scooting away from him. Dean stirred at the movement, his eyes opening and blinking, lost, and he sat up suddenly, his hair rumpled and half of his face marked from the wrinkles on the sheet.

“Cas?” he demanded, eyes wide, and a grin broke over his face when he spotted that Castiel’s eyes were open. Dean reached out and touched Castiel’s face, his shoulders relaxing like a weight had been lifted off of them, while Castiel stared at Dean like an animal poised to run. “Jesus, Cas, I thought we talked about not dropping dead anymore. I thought I’d lost you again.”

Castiel just stared at Dean, not knowing what his expression looked like, not opening his mouth because he felt like all that would come out would be screaming.

Dean looked at Castiel for a moment before his face fell, his joy chased away by worry, and he asked, “Are you okay?”

Castiel, of course, didn’t answer. Thankfully, he was saved from it by the Winchester genetic ability to walk in at the perfectly right time, because that was the moment Sam loped into the room, grinning widely when he saw that Castiel was awake.

“Cas,” Sam greeted, sounding relieved. “Real worried for a while there, man. How you feeling?”

Castiel didn’t respond. Sam glanced at Dean, looking shocked, before sadness came over his face. Sam was smart—he would immediately think that Castiel was catatonic because of the attack, because he may have seen Hell again (because Castiel was more than sure that he had died on the warehouse floor). Sam was book-smart, and that was what a book-smart person would logically come to the conclusion of, and Castiel didn’t care enough to let him think anything else. It took everything in Castiel not to let his hands start shaking, but his whole body felt like it was being crushed by bricks, and Castiel was afraid to move.

“I just got off the phone with Bobby,” Sam told the two of them slowly, carefully, all for Castiel’s benefit, obviously thinking that anything might trigger him and send him spiraling downward. Sam sent a meaningful look to Dean before he continued, “I filled him in on what’s happened. He said that he’d head here if Cas didn’t improve, so I’ll have to call him again and tell him to stay put. He said he was going to call Ellen and Jo and tell them what he can.”

Castiel didn’t react. He felt detached—he couldn’t feel Dean’s hand where he was gripping his wrist, but he could see it with his own eyes, and he knew Sam was speaking and he could hear him, but all he could focus on was the loud sound of his blood pumping. He felt himself blinking, slowly, almost like he was trying to, but it wasn’t on purpose, was barely even on accident. Castiel felt like he was moving at a horrible, muddled speed, and he would never be able to break out of the slump.

“Cas?” Dean asked, and Castiel didn’t look, didn’t blink, but he heard him. But he couldn’t address him. He saw Dean look at Sam, terrified. “What the hell is he doing?”

“Dean,” Sam said slowly, waving a hand in front of Castiel’s face, but Castiel didn’t react. “Dean, go get a doctor, right now.”

“What’s happening?”

“He seems kinda catatonic. Probably mentally fucked up from Alastair, and he can’t escape his mind.”

“But he was moving earlier.”

“Probably hadn’t hit him yet. Something else might be wrong—he did _die_ in there, Dean. We don’t know what he saw when he died, if he was sent back downstairs. This is way beyond us, so just go call a damn doctor.”

“Not necessary,” Anna announced somberly from the foot of the bed, where she suddenly appeared. She looked terrible—her hair was pulled up at the top of her head messily and her eyes looked sunken and stressed. Her jacket was torn, and there was still a sign of dirt and blood on her skin from the struggle that Castiel had heard before he had lost his grip on life. The brothers jumped, turning to look at her, but she was looking at Castiel, her eyes seeing right through him. “He’s not permanently in that state, if that’s what you’re thinking. He knows what he’s doing.”

“It’s possible to be catatonic on purpose?”

“Castiel sat through a lot of torture in Hell during his day,” Anna educated the brothers like she was telling them about her personal hero for a school project, her words framed carefully, like Sam’s, like she thought Castiel was going to snap out of it and turn destructive at anything. “I think he’s inside of his mind, protecting him from himself.”

Castiel was almost surprised that Anna was so perceptive. But, yet again, Heaven might have access to more knowledge about himself that even he knew.

Somehow, it wouldn’t surprise him.

“I just stopped by to make sure he’s okay,” Anna confessed to the brothers sheepishly, shame washing over her features. “I don’t know what happened, truly, I don’t know how Alastair could have broken that trap. But I’m going to find out.”

“Where did Cas go?” Dean demanded, glancing nervously toward Castiel when he asked about him like he wasn’t sitting right there, but Castiel didn’t move or acknowledge it. “He was gone when I got to him. There was no heartbeat, and he wasn’t breathing.” Dean’s voice broke, and he cleared his throat. “Was he in Hell?”

“I don’t know,” Anna said, sounding defeated, looking to Castiel again. “Educated guess? No. They wouldn’t have given up his soul if they got their hands on it again.”

“Why does he look so shell-shocked?”

“Because I think I broke him,” Anna told Dean, sounding tortured, and she closed her eyes, her entire face so pained that not even Dean opened his mouth to accuse her, to blame her for what happened, because it was so sincere and true that it could have broken everyone’s hearts in the room if they were fragile at all. “He warned me that I wouldn’t like the person that came out if I sent him in to torture Alastair. Something must have happened—I wish I knew, I’m sorry.”

“You almost got him killed, and all you have to say is that you are _sorry_?” Dean demanded, annoyed, getting to his feet. “You were supposed to be able to protect him.”

“I couldn’t,” Anna admitted, raising her chin, “so I’m going to do what I can to make up for it. This is the way the world works, Dean. Believe it or not.”

Sam rose slowly, looking between his brother and the angel cautiously. “Let us know if you find anything, Anna.”

Anna nodded before she turned to leave, but she froze when Castiel spoke.

“Was he telling the truth?”

Sam and Dean turned to look at Castiel, wide-eyed, but Castiel wasn’t looking at them. His eyes were on Anna, and their eyes connected the moment she turned around, looking only vaguely surprised, like she had expected that to be his trigger the entire time, and she was only waiting for him to ask. She looked at him for a long moment, not saying anything, and his irritation was making Castiel’s fingers twitch impatiently at his sides.

For a long beat, no one said anything. The brothers looked between them as Anna and Castiel held eye contact, both of them trying to read each other, but Castiel wasn’t nearly as impatient. He clenched his jaw.

“You know what he told me,” Castiel announced slowly, watching her closely. “Was Alastair telling the truth?”

Anna paused. And then she said, softly, “I’m sorry.”

That was a better answer than any.

Castiel looked away sharply, toward the window, and he didn’t pay any attention when she muttered that she would be back and disappeared in the sound of fluttering wings. He breathed out sharply through his teeth before closing his eyes, his hand curling into a tight fist on the sheets, and he didn’t have to look to know that the brothers were having a conversation with their eyes, wondering what the hell to do with this.

Dean asked, “Cas?”

“When can I get out of this hospital?” he demanded, opening his eyes again with a scowl. “I’m fine. I don’t need to be hooked up to a million machines.”

“You almost flat-lined in the ambulance and died for sure in the warehouse, Cas,” Sam told him patiently, reaching out and putting a hand on his shoulder. “Just take a deep breath, okay? We have nowhere we need to be.”

Castiel felt restless. He felt like a fucking failure. He felt like he was going to start screaming. But all he managed to do was nod once at Sam, managed to breath out again through his teeth, and Sam took that as best as he could with a chipper smile before removing his hands and asking if he was hungry, getting up out of his chair and saying that he should tell the staff he was awake. Sam was out the door before Castiel could think to answer any of his questions, and he watched Sam disappear out the doorway and down the hall, not saying a word. He turned to look at Dean when he felt the weight of his stare, and Dean was indeed watching him, looking like he was about to watch a bomb go off.

Castiel said, “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t,” Dean said, closing his eyes, and it looked like he had aged a hundred years when Dean whispered, “Just, don’t.”

Dean leaned forward and pressed his lips to Castiel’s face and it took all he could not to flinch away, because he didn’t deserve Dean and Dean could do better. But he didn’t want to have this discussion when Dean had almost lost him twice in a row, in one day.

Castiel was broken, and he was the reason for the world ending, but he couldn’t break Dean Winchester.

So he spoke to the doctor Sam returned with, ate the food that he was given, and let them give him pain medication. He slept when they wanted him to, and he walked out of the hospital when he had been cleared two days later. Castiel ran through the motions, knowing that the world would soon collapse around him, because he couldn’t keep what he knew from the Winchester brothers forever.

The day of reckoning came sooner than expected.


	14. And It Is Written

Because it was home, they ended up at Bobby’s again.

Castiel had entertained the notion of stopping in at the Roadhouse instead, but he knew the Winchesters never would have been truly comfortable there, and somehow he was still selflessly putting them before him, so he fell into their routine of retreating back to the Singer house as if he belonged there. He masochistically offered to take the cot in the panic room over the couch in the living room, claiming he didn’t want to sleep in the middle of all of the action—but, truly, it was because of the harsh burn he felt every time he stepped over the threshold of the Devil’s trap, because of the way he felt like he was deteriorating every time he stayed in there for extended periods of time. His sins had gotten worse since the last time he had been in the trap, and the sickness it expelled on him was worse this time around, burning him inside out, and some days he could barely force himself to crawl out of the room, could barely muster up that last piece of humanity to get him out. He let the guilt, the fear, the sin tear him apart and eat away at him.

And Sam, Dean, Bobby—they could tell. Of _course_ they could. Castiel’s self-destruction wasn’t subtle. But they didn’t seem to know how to stop him as they watched him spend sleepless days at a time sitting at various places around the house and property pouring over photocopied pages of Bobby’s detailed copy of Revelations. Dean had tried multiple times to convince Castiel to sleep, to eat, to take his pills, but had only succeeded a couple of times, only enough that it kept him with enough hope to keep at it, and Castiel allowed Dean to have that one thing. Sometimes, he couldn’t let himself give into Dean, because hadn’t Dean been the original sin? And yet, Castiel should have known that he wouldn’t have been able to resist his original sin for long, because that’s why he was his sin.

Castiel was mostly recovered physically from the incident with Alastair; his spine had been badly injured in the warehouse but had healed “miraculously” during his stay in the hospital, more than likely Anna’s doing, and Castiel should have had brain damage from the strong hits to his skull, but he managed to recover only with the occasional unexpected headache. Castiel had died on the floor of the warehouse, he knew that, and he was thankful that he didn’t know what happened between the three minutes his heart stopped beating to when he opened his eyes to find Dean breaking down over him.

Castiel couldn’t help but to wish that whomever running the show had just let him die.

He felt so guilty, so responsible. Tragedies were appearing on the news that weren’t even subtly paranormal, and every single one of them felt like a sharp knife into his chest. He knew it was illogical, the amount of blame he was putting on himself, but then he considered the forces of Heaven and Hell that were at war, and he looked at the people who were dying every day without knowing what is truly happening, he couldn’t help but to feel as though he deserved every single piece of pain for not being able to handle it when it had mattered.

On top of that, Castiel felt as though he now understood what had happened to him in the warehouse, and he was just waiting for the moment of truth, wondering just how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

About ten days after he had been released from the hospital, he found his answer.

Castiel felt it like a sixth sense. He silently slipped from the back door of the Singer house into the yard, unarmed and uncaring, knowing what he would find in the night sky.

Halfway into the yard, Castiel stopped. He put his hands in his pockets and looked forward casually, feeling the hostile static to his left, and he said easily into the dark, “You tricked them for a while.”

“No tricks,” Uriel responded, stepping into the light casted from the barn and the house collectively, stepping into the open, his confidence overwhelming and misguided. He stood tall, like a soldier, as he looked down on Castiel. “Only disillusion. I do serve loyally—just not to the same means as my colleagues.”

“There were at least a dozen easier ways to kill me.”

“Ah, but none nearly as convenient.” Uriel smiled slowly, like a lazy cat of prey. “Alastair shouldn’t have even been caught in the first place. And then all I had to do was turn a knob and let the water drip on the circle and let the demon be the scapegoat.”

“Will demons be blamed for this?” Castiel demanded, gesturing to himself with one hand, his eyebrows rising. “Dear me. Maybe I should have brushed my hair, make it look a little less sloppy.”

Uriel laughed like he couldn’t help it. “I hate humans—you’re hairless apes. But you, Castiel—you made it all happen, sure, but there’s something else about you. You’re like an angelic power source. Can’t help but to think you might have done us some good in another life.”

“Maybe I will anyway,” Castiel told him, shrugging. “Seems like I can’t seem to stay dead these days.”

“You will this time. Of that, I’m certain.”

“You’re that sure?” Castiel asked.

Uriel looked at him before smiling. “I will if I have to. But I have reconsidered my previous decision to get you out of the way. Your darkness—it’s astounding, Castiel. It might be enough for you to understand me, to join me.”

“You’re trying to convert me?” Castiel stared the angel down, frowning. “To what?”

“My cause,” Uriel explained simply. “My brothers and sisters that have perished—that wasn’t murder, dear Castiel, but _conversion_. They resisted against the order I wish to bring them. They didn’t see it—they didn’t understand—but you? You would surely sympathize with my cause. You are powerful enough to help me raise my brother.”

“Raise—?” Castiel started to say before stopping, freezing cold. “You mean Lucifer.”

“He was so strong, and the most beautiful,” Uriel mourned, shaking his head, as if he was disappointed that the others hadn’t seen what he had, as if he couldn’t fathom how they could be so blind. “He was the best of us. He didn’t bow to humanity, and then he was punished for protecting us, for protecting the angels he was loyal to and loved because they were the creations of our Father. Now, Castiel, if you could ever believe in anything, wouldn’t you believe in the righteous? Wouldn’t you believe in the rebel that had it right under a dictatorship that wouldn’t let his voice be heard?”

“Lucifer is not God,” Castiel heard himself say softly, almost mechanically, feeling horrified and weak and sick.

Uriel’s eyes flashed as he growled, “ _God_ isn’t God anymore. He doesn’t care what we do. I am proof of that.”

“What are you going to do, Uriel?” Castiel demanded. “Kill your entire garrison?”

“I only kill those who have said no to joining my cause,” Uriel informed Castiel in a calm voice that made his stomach turn. “Others have joined me, Castiel, and others would join me if I had you on my side. You could tilt the scale, Castiel—you could be like God to angels. You just have to help me. You have to help me bring about the end of the seals, to bring the apocalypse. You have to help me spread the word. Help me, Castiel, and be unafraid.”

“For the first time in a long time,” Castiel said slowly, evenly, “I _am_ unafraid.”

Uriel’s eyes lit with hellfire when he smiled. And then Castiel surged forward and punched the angel as hard as he could.

Uriel reacted in the way Castiel expected him to. Uriel struck with heavenly force, and Castiel slammed hard into the nearest car, hitting his head and groaning as he slid down to the ground. He grunted as he pushed himself up onto all fours, moving to stand, but Uriel was there first, grabbing onto his shirt collar and tugging him up to meet him face-to-face. Uriel was livid. Castiel was just waiting for the vengeful angel to kill him.

“I believed in you to understand me,” Uriel hissed harshly between his teeth. Castiel smiled unevenly, tasting blood.

“You can’t win, Uriel,” Castiel told him. “I serve God more than I serve you.”

“You haven’t even met the man!” Uriel yelled at him, throwing him again, and Castiel rolled with the force as he slammed into the ground. “There is no _will_ ,” Uriel continued as he walked back to Castiel, kicking him hard in the stomach, leaving Castiel gasping for air. “No _wrath_.” Uriel stomped down on Castiel’s ribs, and Castiel felt several of them snap. Uriel breathed fire as he finished harshly, crazed, “No _God_!”

Uriel pulled out his blade and started for Castiel, but froze at the sound of an unexpected voice.

“Maybe there _is_ a God,” Anna said fiercely, stepping out from the shadows. “Or maybe not. But there’s still me.”

Her angel blade fell from her sleeve as the Winchester brothers emerged from the shadows behind her, Sam’s face drawn with darkness and Dean’s face mixed with hatred and worry. His eyes immediately fell on where Castiel was on the ground, struggling to pull himself up through the new aching in his chest, and Castiel met his eyes and shook his head, urging him to stay where he was. Dean’s mouth pressed into a thin line as Castiel turned his attention back to the angels standing before each other, both armed and unmoving, just staring at the brother and sister they each felt was betraying them for different reasons.

“You’re siding with them?” Uriel demanded incredulously, his eyes sloping over the Winchester brothers before snapping back to her, his frown deepening chasms into his face, making him look so inhuman. “You’re siding with a so-called _God_?”

“Better a God than a Devil,” Anna told him through her teeth. “You have been killing our brothers and sisters, and you attempted to end Castiel’s life, all for this meaningless cause?”

“It’s a lot less meaningless than you think it is,” Uriel responded, laughing. “Oh, Anna, do you not see how unprepared we were? The angels are scrambling, and they are failing. Seals are being broken every other day, and it is only a matter of time before the end is nigh. There is only one true side.”

“You did not side with Lucifer,” Anna said slowly, “when he fell from grace.”

“It took time, and anarchy,” Uriel replied. “Look at the order of Heaven—where are the archangels? Where is our Father? They have abandoned us. Our will, it is not coming from them. With Lucifer there will be _real_ leadership. There will be a _real_ belief to fight for.”

“You are in the wrong, Uriel,” Anna told him, her voice trembling in the force of her anger. “I will do everything in my power to stop you, and to stop those like you.”

“Do as you wish,” Uriel said, “but you will lose. Heaven is not as powerful as we would like to believe. It is losing more and more ground every day, and soon the angels will grow weaker than the demons, and they will fall to them. Heaven will be worth nothing, and Lucifer will rise and reclaim it for himself, as he so deserves.”

“I will not follow you,” Anna told him softly, standing firm.

Uriel looked at her for a long moment, at how strong she was, and then he burst out into laughter that echoed in the vast expanse of the sky, and Castiel wondered if even Heaven could hear this angel laughing at it. “You plan to stand behind a man more monster than human, a man who is so tainted by Hell that he can barely escape a Devil’s trap? The _angels_ will put their faith in a mortal soul destroyed by Hell itself?”

“Castiel is the Righteous Man,” Anna announced proudly, and Castiel heard the capital letters in the title, and he felt the foreboding sinking into his stomach because he knew what was coming next from that announcement, knew it from the moment the words left her mouth and Uriel’s patronizing grin turned into a mocking smile. Castiel wobbled on his feet, bracing himself for the impact, feeling the mask of his inner demon crawling its way to the surface.

“The Righteous Man,” Uriel laughed, and then loudly recited words Castiel had only before heard in Alastair’s voice: “And so it is written that the first seal shall be broken when a righteous man sheds blood in Hell. As he breaks, so shall it break.” Uriel laughed again, even louder, before he asked, “You’re going to put the destiny of Heaven into the hands of the man who brought forth the apocalypse?”

“I am not the only one who believes in the prophecy of the Righteous Man,” Anna told the angel confidently, as if Castiel’s world wasn’t falling apart all over again. “You know the fate that can only fall upon Castiel. The righteous man that begins it is the only one who can finish it.”

“The Righteous Man can only tip the scale whichever way he prefers,” Uriel said, “if he is alive to do so.”

Uriel turned, but he did not expect Castiel to be there. Castiel twisted Uriel’s wrist and grabbed the angel blade from his grip, bringing his hand hard to its target, stabbing Uriel swiftly, showing no emotion. Uriel screamed as white light flared out of his eyes and mouth, making Castiel have to turn away his gaze as he yanked the blade out of Uriel’s body, and Uriel’s light flickered out of existence as he hit the ground on his back, his arms spread out, like a crucifixion. Burned onto the ground, great and terrible, was a pair of angel wings.

For a moment, no one moved. And then Anna took several steps forward until she was standing next to Castiel, looking down at Uriel’s body.

“What does it mean?” Castiel asked her, his voice too loud in the unearthly silence of a fallen angel, and Anna tilted her head to look at him, not needing him to elaborate.

“I don’t know,” she replied softly.

“Bullshit.”

“I don’t.” She turned until she was fully facing Castiel, her eyes determined. “Castiel, they don’t tell me much, but I know our fate rests with you.”

“Then you guys are screwed,” Castiel whispered in response, his voice shaking. “I can’t do it, Anna. Alastair and Uriel, they were right—I’m not all here, and you know it. You know what he said about Devil’s traps are true. I’m not—I’m not strong enough to stop this. I’m not the man your dad wanted me to be.”

“Castiel,” Anna said, reaching for him, but Castiel slid away without breaking their eye contact. He took a shaky breath, looking at an angel whose heart and hope was breaking in front of him, and he pulled away the last reinforcement keeping her faith from tumbling to the ground.

“Find someone else,” Castiel told her, “because it’s not me.”

Castiel turned away from him, tucking the angel blade blindly into his belt, passing by where Bobby was standing without looking at him, without looking back at any of them. He felt like he would crumble at the gust of a good wind but he tore through the Singer house like a hurricane as he moved to where his bag was already packed at the foot of the stairs, slinging it over his back. He was out the door and moving down the drive in seconds, and he didn’t have to look over his shoulder to see if they would follow him, because he knew they wouldn’t.

They hadn’t believed him the first time that he had told them that he had become a monster, but now they knew just how much of a monster he was. Now they knew they would have to hunt him if they ever saw him again.

Castiel walked for miles, leaving behind bleeding hearts and betrayals, until he found a car to steal. He drove until he was out of gas, and then he stole another car and did the same, until the cycle was too much.

The moment that he had to stop, when he was so far away that he couldn’t even begin to know how to retrace his steps back to the way it all used to be, Castiel screamed until his lungs were sore, and he cried until the pain in his chest won over, and he drifted away.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> Due to a recent surgery, I may have to go on a two-week hiatus, especially in regards to this story. Watch my Tumblr for updates about if that hiatus will be necessary, or, if you don't see an update next week, that's why! :)


	15. Far From Home

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Instead of updating every Sunday, I am changing it to being twice a month, on the 15th and on the 30th. If I manage to get far enough ahead in writing and I remain not-super-busy (unlikely), I will change it back to weekly, but you know real life--always getting in the damn way.
> 
> Thanks for sticking through it with me, friends! I really appreciate it!
> 
> Enjoy!

Castiel knew it had been too much time when he walked through the door, but he didn’t know what kind of apology to give for it. He wasn’t thinking entirely clearly as he pushed open the doors of the Roadhouse, feeling as numb as he had the last time he had done this action, only hours after he had pulled himself from beneath the earth. He knew he would soon face blame and anger, but the moment he felt the rumble of the Roadhouse under his feet, when he smelled the scents that could only converge in this small structure, he felt a feeling of home and acceptance so strong that it nearly knocked him to his knees.

Castiel had walked through those doors many times, but somehow this time was different. He shoved his hands into his pockets and meandered into the crowded bar, nodding toward acquaintances who seemed almost thankful he didn’t come over to start conversation as they nodded back.

Jo’s last public reaction to seeing him hadn’t gone unnoticed and unquestioned. Hunters didn’t seem to know where to step when they were with him.

It was a good thing Castiel had been so adamant about being alone or else he would have been offended at the wide berth his colleagues had been giving him.

Castiel stood tall and unafraid, numb to it all as he gazed around the room, looking for someone without trying to look like he was looking. He should have known she’d find him first.

“I see you’ve taken a liking to long disappearances,” a voice he missed with the crushing of his chest spoke behind him, tone relieved and irritated all at once, but he couldn’t help the smirk that hooked onto his lips as he swung to casually face her, his shoulders hitching upwards in a careless shrug.

“There’s a lot of reasons to disappear,” he told Ellen honestly, and the relief seemed to win out over her anger as her face crumbled, and she pulled him into a soft hug, a forgiving embrace. Castiel almost pulled away, because he forgot what forgiveness felt like.

“Goddamn, Castiel,” Ellen muttered, scowling at him, “you’re really keeping my nerves up, you hear me? When you’re not in the hospital, you’re gone off the face of the earth. You can’t keep doing that to me, boy.”

“I’ve had my reasons,” Castiel told her simply without offering any more information for the moment, smiling only a little sheepishly. “How’ve you been, Ellen?”

“Worried out of my _mind_ ,” she snapped at him, the irritation reappearing out of nowhere and without mercy as she took another step closer to him, at least a foot shorter, but it felt like she was towering over him. Castiel cowered back a little as she growled, “I don’t give a shit what bad stuff is happening that made you run, Castiel, but do not leave us without word like that again. You had us all worried sick out of our minds. Those Winchester boys dropped hunting for _weeks_ trying to find you.”

“I didn’t want to be found.” Castiel looked up into Ellen’s eyes, begging her silently to see how trapped he was in his own skin, screaming, trying to get someone to hear him as he drowned. Her eyes suddenly filled with shock, and her mouth opened in a silent question as she looked at him carefully, tilting her head slightly. He shook his head before he murmured to her, “Later.”

“Okay, Castiel,” she said softly, pressing her lips together worriedly, and the burning he had been feeling pressed beneath his skin relented momentarily, the slightest of all relief. She rubbed her palms on her jeans. “You want to get some sleep, or are you going to hang out around the bar?”

“I think I’m gonna try my hand at some pool,” Castiel told her, grinning. “Might see if I can at least win a soda off of Jo at one of the shooting games. Like old times.”

Ellen looked like she wanted to be mad. She wanted to be a mother and wanted to embrace him without question and with open arms. She wanted to be a friend and wanted to know if he was doing alright. But he saw the flash of sadness in her eyes when she tried to hide it from him, because she was all of those things to him and he knew her well, and she was perceptive enough to know that things couldn’t be the way that they were before he went to Hell.

So she let him have this. He assumed she and Jo would be watching him the entire night that he hustled at pool and won himself a small fortune of about five hundred dollars and a half-melted Snicker’s bar. Jo awarded him a soda even when he lost to her at the shooting game, and Ellen made him eat at least a pound of bar pretzels. He helped them clean up after the shift, all of them somehow content with a patient silence, and they took their seats around the same table as they had the last time he was there when they were finished, but so much had changed in those few months.

“You need to start keeping contact so we don’t have to do these powwows in the middle of the night,” Jo told Castiel through a big yawn. “A girl needs her beauty sleep.”

“You’re mighty beautiful enough to manage a couple more hours awake,” Castiel told her, and she slapped him with her bar towel, but she was grinning wildly at him and offered him a wink before Ellen sighed, leaning forward and rubbing her face.

“So we’re going to avoid the topic?” Ellen asked impatiently.

“I’ve been dealing with some personal issues,” Castiel told them, smiling pleasantly. “I needed to get away from it all for a little bit and figure some things out for myself. If I hadn’t left suddenly, y’all wouldn’t have let me leave at all.”

Jo nodded a little, recognizing it as truth, but Ellen wasn’t ever nearly as easily swayed.

“Everything was a mess before you took off,” Ellen pointed out, her eyebrows soaring. “He probably didn’t tell us the half of it, but Sam said you were breaking down. Said you even made yourself catatonic at the hospital. But here you are, walkin’ around, all smiles and laughs, not seeming bothered at all that you have been spending the last three months extensively covering up your tracks to keep from being found. People usually only do that for a reason, Castiel.”

Castiel showed a little more storm in his voice when he said clearly, “I needed to stay away.”

“And by that,” Jo whispered softly, “you mean that you needed _us_ to stay away.”

“I think both sides apply, yes,” Castiel admitted, shrugging. “How much do you know, about what happened before I left?”

Jo and Ellen glanced at each other, just a quick gaze, but it spoke volumes.

“Ah,” he said, and sat back, suddenly not able to look at them.

“We will never blame you for a thing, Castiel, you know that,” Ellen asserted powerfully, but her voice was just a little too unsure. “I know that you’re dealing with what happened to you.”

“I am,” Castiel blatantly lied.

“Then that’s what counts,” Ellen said, grinning at him. “Boy is it good to see you again, you handsome asshole. You really gotta stop bein’ so flighty, you hear me?”

“Loud and clear,” Castiel laughed, rolling his eyes, but he was so incredibly thankful that they didn’t ask, that they didn’t look with pity, that they changed the subject, that he could have broken down right then and there. He clasped his hands hard onto his chair as he asked, “How’ve you two been?”

And, if it weren’t for the pulse of something unearthly under his skin, Castiel could have convinced himself that everything was as okay as they all seemed to want it to be.

*

The sign said Dr. Badass was in, so Castiel gathered all the pride he had left and knocked at the door.

“Ash?” Castiel called into the silence, leaning closer to the door, listening for any sound. “You in there? I gotta talk to you.”

He paused another few seconds, listening closely for any sign of life. And then the door was suddenly jerked open and Ash’s grinning face appeared in front of him, startling Castiel, but the mullet-ed man didn’t even seem to notice or care.

“Good to see you, Castiel,” Ash commented, tipping a nonexistent hat to him. “Been meanin’ to call you lately, anyway. Figured out a while back what you were doing, and been wonderin’ if you were needing any help.”

“Nothing I couldn’t handle,” Castiel told him, shrugging before crossing his arms over his chest. “So I assume you know why I’m here?”

“Got a couple of ideas, chico,” Ash replied casually, scratching at his arm. “Would invite you in, but this is holy space, you know? You mind taking this show on the road?”

“Ellen and Jo went to bed an hour ago,” Castiel told him. “We can take it to the bar.”

“I like the way you think, angel boy,” Ash told him, suddenly chipper, waving him away. “I’ll grab the goods. You grab the betters.”

Castiel wandered back into the bar and assumed what Ash meant by “betters” to be beer, so he grabbed a couple and set them on the counter as he took a stool, letting the bottle cool the skin of his palms. Ash swaggered out of the back room with a heap of junk metal that was obviously a creation of his and a stack of papers in his hands. Ash shoved the papers at Castiel before setting the device clattering onto the bar, smirking over at Castiel when he gave the machine a cautious glance.

“This baby has been through a bit with me,” Ash told him while fondly patting the device. “It’s a laptop of sorts. My own mobile search engine. Used it to help the Winchester boys track that Yellow Eyed demon, but figured it still had enough juice left in her to help with your little problem as well.”

“So you know what I’ve been doing all this time?” Castiel demanded, leaning closer even as Ash downed two beers like he was in the fucking alcoholic Olympics. “You know that I’ve been stopping seals?”

“Wouldn’t take a genius to figure it out,” Ash snorted, and then paused, his head tilting as he considered. “Nah, maybe it does. No one else seemed to think along the same lines as me.”

Castiel, and everyone else on the planet, all seemed to forget that Ash actually _is_ a genius. It was so hard to look past the smell of hemp and the rockin’ mullet to see it clearly.

Ash let out a loud and undignified burp before tapping away at the machine, telling Castiel, “Seals are definitely a lot easier to pick up on than demons are, since they don’t really have minds of their own, and I managed to catch a lot of them right before you got to stoppin’ them. Is this some self-responsibility thing or something?”

“Or something,” Castiel muttered, watching Ash work. “Have you figured out anymore that I haven’t gotten to?”

“A dozen, amigo,” Ash told him mournfully, sighing. “This kind of stuff—not made for humans to deal with, you know? Too big for us. They’re breaking faster than you or anyone else is gonna be able to stop them.”

Castiel sighed and hung his head, a little more than frustrated. He’d stopped at least two dozen seals since the beginning, constantly on the move, constantly fighting with forces he didn’t understand yet, and this was where he was going to end up all along? Having Ash tell him that it wasn’t going to be good enough, no matter how hard he tried?

Ash sensed Castiel’s disappointment, because he patted him on the back. “No worries, grasshopper. Nothing much you can do at this point. Any news from your angel friends?”

“No,” Castiel lied, and it tasted like acid on his tongue.

He wanted to tell Ash, if he told anyone. He didn’t know why, but he felt like Ash would be the only one who understood what this kind of divine intervention was like. He felt like Ash wouldn’t blink if Castiel told him that the angels were playing him like he was a puppet to fit their means. Ash wouldn’t spend too much time out of his day checking to see if Castiel was alright. Ash wouldn’t judge him if Castiel told him that it was harder to get up every day, that he went through every day weakened more and more by Devil’s traps, to the point that, if he had a bad day, he couldn’t even escape one, and he fell asleep inside of them screaming until his lungs were raw.

Ash wouldn’t fuss over him if Castiel told him that he hadn’t been in Hell the last three months, but it had been the closest equivalent to it that he will ever get on Earth.

Like he knew what Castiel was thinking, or what Castiel was thinking of saying, Ash suddenly cleared his throat and swung around to face Castiel, looking a little uneasy, watching him carefully before he cleared his throat again, getting the confidence he needed.

“You should really get back in contact with the Winchesters,” Ash said.

And Castiel didn’t tell him a thing.

Castiel let out a long breath before he challenged, “Why?”

“Because you’re falling apart without them,” Ash told him, and Castiel felt a surge of anger that evaporated when Ash continued, “and they’re falling apart without _you_.”

“I doubt that,” Castiel replied, laughing. “Sam and Dean have always done well enough without me.”

Ash made a doubtful sound as he paid his attention on the screen in front of him. Castiel scowled at him.

“You got an opinion, Ash?” Castiel demanded when the man didn’t speak.

Ash shrugged. “You tear the brothers apart a little bit more every time you leave.”

“You expect me to be able to go back and face them, knowing that they know I started the end of the world?”

“You faced us and you were fine,” Ash told him before rolling his eyes. “They stopped by a couple of times to see if we’d heard anything. Asked me to take a look for you. Told them that you wouldn’t be found unless you wanted to be. And then, less than a month later, in you walk. Suddenly found.”

“You’re a lot more perceptive than we give you credit for, huh?” Castiel asked.

“Fuck yeah,” Ash replied, and then belched again.

Castiel somehow managed to bite back the first true laugh he felt in a long time as he pushed himself off of his stool, stretching. “Gonna step out for a smoke. You wanna join?”

“Nah, man, I quit that weak shit,” Ash replied with a dramatic roll of his eyes. “Since when have you smoked?”

“Since three months ago,” Castiel told him, heading for the door. “Work some magic for me, Dr. Badass.”

“Of course, handsome,” Ash responded sarcastically, and Castiel chuckled under his breath as he emerged into the night air, breathing in the air of the first of April, a new month for him to (probably) fuck up more of the greatest things that have happened to his life. Castiel sighed as he leaned against the Roadhouse, digging around in his pockets.

He pulled free a cigarette and parked it between his lips as he searched for his lighter and lit the tip. He breathed in the smoky nicotine deeply and breathed out through his nose, leaning his head back until it thumped against the wall.

Castiel was losing control. Of his life, of his mind. Of everything. But he could pretend for a smoke break that he wasn’t, and that’s why his addiction was becoming a little more than something to be concerned about.

Castiel was taking another long drag when he felt the static, and he sighed.

“I thought we already talked about this,” Castiel muttered around the cigarette, reaching up and plucking it from his lips with two fingers, turning his head to look at Anna. She leaned against the wall beside him, crossing her arms over her chest as if she was cold, her head tilted up to look at the stars.

“We did talk about this,” Anna replied, and then shrugged. “None of this has been my call. I _am_ thankful though, Castiel. I know how much of a personal sacrifice it has been for you, to help us with the seals the way you have. But you and I both know that, although it was a good effort, it wasn’t nearly good enough.”

“When was it ever going to be good enough?” Castiel demanded sarcastically, snorting before taking another long drag. Anna paused to watch him, her head tilted curiously, before training her eyes back on the constellations.

“Lilith is getting closer to the finish line,” Anna said softly, “but _you_ seem closer to giving up.”

“I think it’s understandable that depression is starting to kick in at the end of the road, don’t you?” Castiel demanded, dropping the cigarette to the ground and lighting another. “I know you’re not here to berate me on my mental health.”

“I am not berating you,” she replied, “and you are right. That’s not why I stopped by.”

She turned to face him, but kept her shoulder leaning against the building. He turned only his head to look at her, and she seemed to think that satisfactory attention enough. She opened her mouth to speak before she suddenly hesitated, straightening up, and Castiel could tell that he wasn’t about to like what he was to hear. He straightened up as well, holding his cigarette in his fingers, and watched as the cold expression of the less-than-Anna Anna slid into place.

“We need your help with something else,” she told him, standing and speaking like a solider. “It’s about Sam Winchester.”

Castiel dropped the cigarette. He didn’t like the way she said his name.

“Sam Winchester is heading down a very dangerous road, Castiel,” Anna told him, “and we don’t know where it leads. So stop it. Or we will.”

Castiel felt too cold when she disappeared in a rustle of wings, and he stumbled until he hit the wall of the Roadhouse again, this time in a desperate attempt to maintain his balance. He felt like he was going to be sick.

Anna, who had been communicating to him his orders from Heaven, had just told him that he would have to kill Sam Winchester.

But only if he couldn’t stop him.

For a couple of minutes, Castiel just stayed in that position, unable to move, staring off into the dark sky and the stars to be seen so far out of town, a sky that might have helped him believe in God if Castiel now didn’t know better. He kicked at his cigarette butts before he pushed himself back to a standing position and moved back into the Roadhouse, feeling sluggish, feeling sick. Ash didn’t even noticed how long he had been gone—or, if he did, he didn’t ask. He just kept tapping away at his computer, eyes unmoving from the screen, his tongue in between his teeth as his brain moved at a speed Castiel couldn’t comprehend.

Before he chickened out, before he retreated away from his duty, Castiel cleared his throat. “Hey, Ash,” he asked cautiously, “do you happen to know where—?”

Ash slid a piece of paper to him, an address already written on it, and, without even looking about from the computer, he said, “They’re here.”

Castiel took the paper cautiously, looking at the address for a long moment, before he folded it up and tucked it safely in his pocket. Castiel looked at the boy genius before him, one of the members of his dysfunctional family, and Castiel suddenly felt like he was choking on emotion as he looked at him, a terrible feeling in the back of his stomach that he couldn’t shake.

“Thanks, Ash,” he told him softly, and Ash looked away from his work only long enough to give him a grin.

Castiel walked away from the Roadhouse the next afternoon, the Harvelles watching him go, and he wondered if he felt sicker about what he was walking toward or about what he was leaving behind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> xo Slang


	16. Miss Missing You

Castiel parked his junker outside of the address Ash had given him, twisting the paper uneasily in between his fingers as he blinked at the one-story shitty motel, his mouth dry and his head spinning as nerves curled sharp claws in his stomach.

He had already stopped into the front office and asked for which room the Winchesters were in—gesturing exaggeratingly a description of Sam Winchester with a height far too high and a large bulk probably accurately wide of the younger brother’s shoulders—and had gotten a positive identification of the two men having checked into room ten, off to the right and three doors down. Castiel had ignored the strange look the man had given him when he watched Castiel get into his car and drive it about three spaces down, parking across the lot, facing the doorway. Castiel tapped nervously at the steering wheel with his thumbs, only feeling slightly relieved to know that the Impala wasn’t parked outside the door, and the Winchesters were paid up until tomorrow morning.

Castiel had taken only a few minutes in the small Minnesota town to stop for coffee and to grab a newspaper, and he saw the reason the Winchesters were hunting here like it was written in dead man’s blood all over the front page. The vampires didn’t seem to have been there long, and they probably weren’t heavy in numbers—the sky was dark, so this was probably the night the brothers were falling on the lair. They probably wouldn’t return for another couple of hours.

But, still, fear kept Castiel rooted to the car. Fear, and dread. He felt like he was going to be sick just looking at the motel room door, knowing who had been behind it before.

Castiel had changed in the last three months, enough for survival, but not enough to be strong enough for this. Not when he remembered the last moments—the way Sam had looked so innocently surprised, like he never would have expected his friend to be able to do something so great and terrible; Bobby dumbstruck, speechless, not even able to reach out and stop Castiel from walking away; and Dean, staring at Castiel like he had never even seen him before, looking like he was just waiting for Castiel to turn and set the world on fire.

Castiel would have left even if he hadn’t already planned to leave. The minute they started planning the trap, he knew he wouldn’t be able to stay. But those looks—they would have pushed him out the door even if he didn’t already have one foot outside already.

He knew he was a coward. He had run from his problems like that would stop them from being, like distance would make it all magically better again, but he knew that wasn’t it. He wanted to wholly pretend like the obvious was the reason he had gone. He would like to blame it all on his weaknesses, his faults, but he knew it wasn’t true.

The real reason he left was the steel in Anna’s eyes when she told him he had to, or she would burn it all down.

She had been on orders. He and Anna had achieved enough of a camaraderie at this point that he knew some of the things she said to him were because she was Heaven’s puppet in communications with the Righteous Man of their prophecies. She hadn’t offered anything to make him think this way, but he couldn’t help but to believe that she hadn’t wanted to push him into a spiraling solitude as much as Castiel liked to try to think he was doing the right thing.

He had tried to stop seals. He had tried to singlehandedly thwart the apocalypse, like the prophecy said that only he could. But he hadn’t done well enough—as if there was a point in his life where Castiel ever had.

The ground under his feet had shifted in the last three months. So many things had changed. So many games had been played, and lost.

Castiel could see freedom, and he saw it in the Winchesters, but he was afraid of what would happen to them in the wrath that would come with his defiance.

For hours, Castiel sat outside of the empty motel room, just staring at the doorway.

Before he could convince himself out of it, Castiel grabbed his coat and his angel blade before getting out of the car and locking it behind him, stalking across the parking lot and picking the lock to the room with quick precision. He shouldered the door open and took a step into the room, locking the door behind him with a twist of his fingers, not taking his eyes off of the rest of the interior. He suddenly felt like he was drowning when he saw one of Dean’s flannel shirts hanging off the back of a chair.

He took a deep breath, breathing it all in.

And then felt it.

Castiel sighed lightly, looking down at his feet with a frown. He was standing on a rug. He didn’t even have to kick at the corner to know there was a Devil’s trap beneath it.

There were some days where Castiel felt it like a pulse of a second heart underneath of his skin, through his veins. Some days, the demonic part of him reared its head with no mercy, and Castiel fell into a darkened pit of despair and an insatiable hunger for something he didn’t understand. Other days, though, he was strong enough. He was more human, and he hadn’t folded to the will of Hell quite yet. Standing inside of a Devil’s trap was just—weakening. It felt like he had just come back from a twenty mile run, his muscles aching, his head pounding, a slight hint of nausea twisting in his stomach.

Castiel took a deep breath before he stepped over the edge of the trap, coming free.

Castiel didn’t want to think of how humiliating it would have been if the Winchesters had returned to the room to find him helplessly caught in their demon trap, if he hadn’t been human enough like he was afraid of being. He would have never been able to look them in the eye again, and he knew it was going to be difficult enough as it is.

Finally able to breathe, with just a small resounding ache, Castiel pressed his way deeper into the room that looked like the million others before it, feeling like a ghost inside of the Winchester’s lives. Castiel awkwardly hovered in the middle of the room, not knowing where to put his limbs, before he pulled out one of the untouched chairs at the small table and pulled it to him, letting his coat hang over the back, feeling like, if he were to touch something, he was going to disturb the natural order.

It felt intrusive. The Winchesters had told him a million times that he would always be welcome with them, but this—this felt like he was an outsider, venturing too far in.

Castiel breathed out heavily, uneasily, before smoothing down his shirt self-consciously. He paced anxiously into the bathroom, flicking on the light switch and turning on the sink, splashing water on his face. He reached out and grabbed a hand towel, rubbing his face hard enough he knew the skin would turn pink, and he caught his reflection in the mirror when the towel dropped.

Castiel had been avoiding his reflection for a long time now.

He looked fucking _terrible_.

His hair was cut crooked and uneven, and some parts stuck up in uncontrollable tufts because he couldn’t be assed to brush it, or fix his own horrible cut job. His face was thinner after day spans of not eating, and the bags under his eyes were the results of an insomnia that his newfound alcoholism couldn’t even solve. His eyes were dull. He was pale. Sickly so.

He looked like a walking cadaver. He looked like he would drop dead at any moment.

It should have horrified him that he didn’t care if he did or not. It should have, but it didn’t. Castiel was starting to think that, whatever life had planned for him, he deserved every second of the suffering that would come.

He couldn’t believe he had been able to fool the Roadhouse with a smile.

Or, he thought, thinking back on the twenty calls from Ellen and Jo combined he had received during his drive, he probably wasn’t fooling anyone at all.

He returned to the chair, slumped forward with his elbows on his knees and his hands clasped as if in prayer before him, and that was the position he was in when the Winchesters arrived.

Castiel made no attempt to move when he heard the key scrape into the lock, when he heard the sound of a familiar voice muttering words that couldn’t be heard through the wood. Castiel didn’t look up when the door swung open and the sounds rushed in. He didn’t even look up when he heard Dean shout, and when he heard the click of a loaded gun.

Castiel didn’t look up until Sam Winchester demanded, “ _Cas_?”

When Castiel’s eyes landed on them, it was to see Sam’s hand clutching Dean’s shoulder, and Dean’s hand with the gun pointed at him falling slowly down to his side, as if he didn’t know whether he should still shoot or not. Castiel didn’t care enough to be offended. He just offered a small, exhausted smile to the brothers, not moving to stand, and said, “Been a while.”

“Cas, Jesus Christ,” Sam said, sounding horrified, staring at him with wide eyes. “What the hell happened to you?”

“Heaven, Hell,” Castiel offered, “and guilt.”

Pity was all he could see in Sam, like Castiel was a kicked puppy; the pity in Sam Winchester was a light brighter than the blinding grace of the angel. He had to look away. But, when he looked away, that meant he was looking at Dean, and the expression he got in response was like a swift kick to the sternum.

Dean’s face was like stone.

Admittedly, Castiel expected no different, but it still stung. It would always sting.

“Cas, buddy,” Sam said slowly, taking an easy step forward, as if Castiel was prone to attacking, “you really don’t look so good. Are you alright?”

It was the fucking stupidest question. Castiel didn’t even offer an answer for it. Sam winced as Castiel looked at him, like he didn’t expect him to answer it either, like the answer was that obvious.

And it must have been. The Winchesters had seen Castiel break more often than anyone else on the planet. They knew what he looked like right before he fell off the edge. They must have been able to see that he was barely holding on by his fingernails, not even entirely sure if it was worth the fight to keep his grip.

It also felt like a ridiculous question, once Castiel got a good look at the younger brother, because Sam, in comparison to usual, looked like he was two seconds from collapsing.

It was more subtle than Castiel’s downturn. Bigger bags under his eyes, a larger dissociation in his gaze, his skin a little more pale than usual. Sam’s shoulders slumped a little more. Sam was trying to keep up appearances, trying to stay in step with his brother, but it was obvious to Castiel that Sam was running from his very own personal demon, and he couldn’t escape it as much as Castiel wished he could escape his.

Castiel felt cold when he remembered the steel in Anna’s voice when she told him to stop Sam Winchester, or they will. Castiel looked at the deteriorating man in front of him, and wondered how they had both become abominations in the face of the faith they had both so struggled to hold firm to.

Sam moved cautiously, crossing the room to sink down at the foot of the bed closest to Castiel, the bed that was usually his in the floor plan, like it was an unspoken agreement that Dean was always between Sam and the entrances, like anything that wanted to come in would have to go through the older sibling. Sam probably didn’t think of it that way, but Dean had to. Castiel hadn’t ever thought about it that way—Castiel typically didn’t think of Sam as having to need someone to protect him, and maybe that was the kind of thinking that had started this mess.

Castiel blinked back into himself when he realized Sam had asked him a question, and the man was frowning at him the longer he didn’t answer. Castiel blinked again, slowly, dizzily, and Sam’s forgiving smile was sick with worry.

“Where have you been, Cas?” Sam asked again, his voice trembling with a worried undertone. He glanced to his brother and Castiel’s gaze followed him, but Dean hadn’t moved from where he was standing, his face betraying no emotion as he stared down Castiel, his eyes shadowed in thought. “I just—we were worried about you, man. We thought you were down in the panic room for a while, before we went to check on you.”

“Devil’s trap,” Castiel reminded them slowly, smiling sadly.

Both the Winchesters glanced toward the rug. Castiel laughed once, but there was no heart in the sound, just a hollow sound that was supposed to mean amusement.

“I can escape them,” Castiel told them in explanation, shaking his head. “I _could_ sleep in the panic room—it just made me sick.”

“You should’ve told us,” Sam replied softly. “I would’ve switched with you.”

“No,” Castiel corrected easily. “You three would have locked me in there for good to make sure I wasn’t a danger to myself or others around me, so I didn’t say anything. It’s not a big deal.”

“You’re a human that gets sick in a Devil’s trap,” Dean grunted from where he still stood like stone, a scowl chiseled into his face. “I’d say that’s a big deal.”

“Perspective,” Castiel offered weakly, shrugging.

Sam cleared his throat, casting his brother a look before turning back to Castiel. “You didn’t answer my question.”

“I’ve been hunting down seals,” Castiel told them flat-out, not wanting to keep any more secrets than he had to. He reached up and rubbed at his face, noticing the thinness of his wrists at the same time Sam did, and he promptly dropped his hands back into their curled position at his knees. “Anna drafted me into their cause on orders from the Big Kahuna in the sky. I’ve been running around the country trying to stop what I can, but, prophecy or not, it’s not easy to stop what’s already gaining momentum. They’re breaking faster than we would like to admit, so they gave me something more important to do.”

“And what is that?” Sam asked, and Castiel suddenly felt sick.

“I don’t know,” he lied only a little, offering a tired grin. “They cryptically as ever told me that they would drop in and let me know when the time came. But they did say it had to do with you two.”

“So _that’s_ why you’re back?” Dean demanded unkindly, his scowl somehow deepening. “On some pointless mission from the Holy Ghost?”

“I didn’t want to drag you two into this,” Castiel replied curtly, shaking his head. “This is my mess, so I’m doing the best I can to fix it. But my best, apparently, isn’t good enough.”

“We don’t blame you for what you’ve done, Castiel.”

“Not with the apocalypse,” Dean edited with an angry mutter, and Sam’s glare toward his brother was acidic.

Castiel ignored them both, looking back at his hands. He could feel Sam watching him, helpless. He was sure he must have looked pathetic, sitting there like a reprimanded child, like a defeated old soul. But Castiel didn’t want to pretend to them. For some reason, he didn’t want to pretend to be alright today to the Winchesters. Maybe tomorrow the fake smile and the fake strength will be back, but today—he couldn’t muster the lie.

“You’re angry at me,” Castiel observed calmly.

Sam began to protest, thinking Castiel was speaking to him, but Dean overpowered his little brother when he growled, “Yeah, Cas, I’m a little pissed off.”

“Why?” he asked, still not looking at him.

“You know why,” Dean growled, but Castiel knew him. He knew Dean would have to yell and throw things and have his angry tantrum, and that nothing could move on before that, so he let it happen. Castiel braced himself for the shouting as Dean’s anger grew. “You took off, Cas, without saying _anything_. You walked out and we didn’t even know you were gone for the first couple of hours. We couldn’t fucking _find_ you. You were _unstable_. I was on the phone with every fucking hospital in the state making sure you weren’t a John Doe in a morgue somewhere because you had gone and _blown your fucking brains out_!”

Normally, Castiel would have been surprised by Dean’s anger, even if he had anticipated it. But this was a different world. Castiel just caved in his shoulders and took it.

“We were scared to death that you had done something stupid!” Dean screamed, gesticulating wildly to illustrate the point of their temporary insanity. “We tried praying to your fucking angels, but no one came down from a bunch of clouds to help us. There was nothing. I was fucking _terrified_.”

Castiel finally looked up and met his eyes. He was nearly knocked off center when he realized Dean wasn’t yelling at him in anger.

Dean Winchester was _scared_.

Castiel got to his feet and stumbled forward two steps, and then froze. Dean stared at him before he looked down to find Castiel had stopped at the edge of the rug with the Devil’s trap, unable to pass for fear of never being able to make it out. A flash of pain lit up Dean’s eyes before he turned and was out the door in a millisecond, slamming it behind him so hard the windows shook in their frames for the long silent seconds following his exit, where neither Castiel or Sam knew what to do.

Castiel took a deep breath, reaching up to rub his face, and Sam sighed.

“He was obviously a little worried,” Sam offered unhelpfully and with an even heavier sigh.

“I assume I should go after him,” Castiel began, “but I’m not entirely sure that he won’t swing at me if I try to go near him.”

As if Castiel had made a joke, Sam snorted and rolled his eyes.

Castiel frowned at the younger Winchester, not entirely understanding how to read his body language now that his mind was filled with a constant anxious mantra of _sostopitorwewill-sostopitorwewill-sostopitorwewill_ every time he looked at Sam. Sam, thankfully, seemed to take pity on him, and he smiled and shook his head.

“He won’t take a swing at you,” Sam assured him, but Castiel wasn’t nearly as confident, not knowing the ways of a Dean Winchester who was truly afraid. “He’s just been worried. It was smart to let him blow off some steam.”

Castiel nodded his thanks. They stood there together for another several seconds, looking at each other, not speaking.

“You should probably try to catch up with him,” Sam told Castiel at the same time Castiel uncertainly said, “Sam—how are you?”

Sam looked taken aback, blinking studiously. “Me? I’m fine. Why?”

“No reason,” Castiel lied, and then offered a fake smile. “I knew you were having a bit of a struggle a while back, and I just wanted to make sure you are okay.”

Sam just looked at Castiel, flabbergasted. Castiel figured that meant the potential end of their conversation and turned to leave.

“You deserve to be forgiven, Cas,” Sam told Castiel to his back as he opened the door and stood there for a moment, letting Sam’s words sink in, and Sam continued, “You haven’t deserved any of this mess. You don’t deserve the blame for all of this.”

Castiel figured they could agree to disagree, and he didn’t say anything else before he walked out of the motel room, letting the door swing shut behind him, and he started off into the night on the hunt for Dean Winchester, not even beginning to know what to say when he found him.

*

It didn’t take long—Dean hadn’t gone far, having made it around the building before he had taken a seat at the curb, his head in his hands. Castiel hesitated only a moment before walking up to him and sinking down beside him, crossing his legs weakly at his ankles and not looking away from the frayed edge of his pant leg, instead listening. After a moment, when Dean didn’t move, Castiel restlessly reached into his jacket and pulled out a cigarette, striking a match in one easy movement and taking a long drag. Castiel waved the match out and let it drop to the ground between him and Dean, blowing out a lungful of smoke.

“Since when do you smoke?” Dean asked into his hands before glancing up, watching with guarded eyes as Castiel took another deep breath and blew out the smoke, his eyes following every single one of Castiel’s movements, and it felt like scrutiny. Castiel felt like he was on trial.

He sure felt guilty enough.

Castiel smiled humorlessly, the cigarette in between his lips, and said, “Since I realized I wasn’t going to live long enough to regret it.”

“Okay, what the hell is your _problem_ lately?” Dean demanded, turning to look at him with eyes that sucked all of the emotion out of air. “You look like a fucking crack addict, and now you’re waxing poetry about how short your life span is. What the hell happened to the guy that—?”

Dean suddenly cut off, looking away. Castiel guessed the rest of the sentence: _the guy that loved me_.

Castiel felt like the biggest asshole on the planet when he murmured, “He broke the world.”

“You think I’m mad about that, don’t you?” Dean replied harshly, narrowing his eyes. “I couldn’t give a shit if you set off a nuke in Heaven or signed up for Hell’s softball team, Cas, you know that. I’m not pissed off because you did what any human would have done—I’m pissed because you ran away from the people you knew would tell you that they didn’t blame you.”

Castiel had been caught off guard about Dean’s observations of him once, but this one was something other. Castiel dropped the cigarette to the ground, grinding it under his heel, looking at Dean curiously, wondering what in the world made a man like him look long and hard at someone like Castiel.

Castiel didn’t deserve Dean Winchester. Castiel wasn’t even entirely sure lately if he deserved to live.  

Dean had a point about his newfound morbidity.

“I didn’t think I could handle the way you would look at me,” Castiel admitted in a whisper, like he was hoping his words would be lost in the wind, “after you knew what happened.”

“Cas, seriously, you know I’m not the best with words, but I don’t care about that. I’m sure, in that situation, we all would have made the same choices as you did. If anything, you should be asking those angels of yours where the hell they were before you even made it downstairs.”

“They didn’t think it was me,” Castiel explained, his hands tightening on his knees. He bit his cheek before continuing. “No one thought it was me, at first. They all thought it was John Winchester.”

Dean blinked. “What?”

“He made a deal with Azazel for your life, Dean,” Castiel reminded him gently, as if Dean would ever let go of the fate that met his father. “His soul went where the rest of them go when their time is up. Alastair—he did the same with your dad as he did with me. Only John lasted longer, absolutely refused to give up. Alastair said that he was one of the real kinds of heroes. And then the Colt Hell gates opened and your dad crawled out before he could be tortured into saying yes, so the demons realized that—I made a deal for Sam. I followed in your dad’s footsteps, Dean. Maybe it was supposed to be you, but it wasn’t, and they guessed the rest. They needed a righteous man, and how much more righteous could a person be to sell their soul selflessly for someone else?”

Dean was quiet for a long moment, so long that Castiel looked away from his thoughtful expression to instead gaze at the street around him, admiring the large field of dying grass directly across the street, before Dean whispered, “I would have made the deal, if you hadn’t.”

“Now can you understand why I couldn’t let you?” Castiel whispered, hiking one corner of his mouth up in some pathetic attempt at a smile, and Dean closed his eyes for a moment like the sight pained him.

“You should have,” Dean told him shakily, his voice laced with guilt he didn’t deserve to carry. “It should have been me. I would go to Hell for you or Sam any day.”

Castiel flinched, because Dean could only say that so easily because he didn’t know Hell. But, despite it all, Castiel knew he would offer his soul up in a heartbeat if it meant keeping the brothers safe and sound, but he didn’t tell Dean that. He had a feeling that would become an argument, and he really didn’t want to be fighting with Dean.

“I don’t think either of us could have stopped it,” Castiel told him honestly, avoiding the million other things he wanted to say. “The way the angels talk, it sounds like it was always destined to happen this way or something. I think that, even if they thought they could break your father, they couldn’t, and it was always going to be me. For better or for worse.”

“Are you okay?” Dean asked Castiel, batting so far out into left field that Castiel felt a moment of whiplash, like the segue was a physical blow, and he looked over at the man beside him to find him sheepish, guilty. “I keep wanting to be mad at you, but I haven’t—I haven’t asked if you are okay.”

“I have been showing a demonic nature lately,” Castiel confessed to Dean, the only person he would ever confess his soul to like this. “It only happens after dark patches in my mood, so I’m trying to stay aboveground, per se, and I believe being around you and Sam will help. I’m making it through. I’m sorry that I left the way I did.”

“I want to be mad about that,” Dean told him, and then shook his head. “No, actually, I’m still really pissed off. We didn’t know where you would go or what you would do—and, for some reason, I kept thinking that you were gonna go blow your brains out or something, and it scared the shit out of me. I—I can’t lose you, Cas. I need you.”

It was the closest to an “I love you” that Castiel knew he would ever get, and they both knew it. Castiel offered Dean a smile and Dean accepted it gratefully, his shoulders slumping back to a posture more casual, less heaped with worry and anger, and Castiel felt that this kind of ease suited Dean. He considered if Dean would have been even more of a kind, easygoing man if the hunting life hadn’t have been forced on him, but Castiel didn’t dwell on it because, even if they both would have once changed their fates in a heartbeat, Castiel knew that he would change nothing about the life he was living right now if it meant he could have this.

Dean didn’t understand Castiel entirely, but perhaps it was for the best that he didn’t. Castiel didn’t know details about Dean in the same way, and neither of them asked for the information or offered to give it because they didn’t need to. Since the beginning, Castiel and Dean had been similar people, driven by the tragedies in the lives they lived and the devastation to do the right thing, but they were different at the same time, with different ambitions. Dean would give up anything for his brother and Castiel would fiercely protect even strangers that wandered into his path. Dean found faith in the people around him and Castiel still clung to the idea of something bigger than all of them. They were similar, but they were also opposites, and it worked for them like a magnet, pulling them together even when they come apart, showing them a life that could combine the opposing views into something one and the same, and it was a concept that Castiel was willing to cling to as long as he was allowed to, no matter the roadblocks that may appear in their way.

Castiel and Dean came back to find the motel room pointedly and conspicuously empty, and it took only one shared curious glance before their mouths were on each other and their hands were burning onto bare skin and the air was heavier than it had been moments ago, their hearts beating loudly and quickly, harmonizing together, and their lips smiled against each others as they toppled onto the bed in a tangle of limbs and skin and burning desire, and they didn’t think twice before they let themselves get lost in it.

Needless to say, Castiel’s imagination had nothing on the real thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not really edited at all. I'll come back and do it later, I promise! I've been too distracted by the world cup.
> 
> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> xo Slang


	17. The Monster at the End of This Book

It was just supposed to be a simple ghost hunt.

Castiel had only been back in the game with the Winchester brothers for a few weeks, but his induction back into their ranks was seamless and caused maximum friction of another kind with the eldest brother, but neither of them could complain about the new twist in their stories. They had all fallen back into their typical routine, and Castiel, all things considered, was handling the demonic issue better than he had been in weeks—partially because Dean did a remarkable job of taking his mind off of it.

Sam seemed suspicious of the change in their relationship—hell, he shouldn’t have been surprised, with the purposeful way he had disappeared from the motel room for hours that wasn’t even a little bit subtle—but none of them said anything about it, and if Dean and Castiel’s hands lingered too long against each other’s or if their shoulders brushed or if they lost themselves in their stares, no one said a thing about it, and they lived the Winchester way: through omission.

All in all, it had been a relieving couple of weeks. Castiel finally felt like he could relax after countless weeks of Anna playing him like a puppet to stop seals. He finally felt like a person again.

He wanted to hate himself, because he thought the only way he could attempt to redeem himself had been to stop what he had started, but maybe Dean was right—maybe it was unreachably far over their heads, and they should let the angels handle it. Dean might have had a point when he told Castiel that the angels were just trying to keep him busy, to keep him out of trouble. Castiel didn’t know anymore.

They had been doing a bunch of little hunts, things that kept popping up, and they all went happily. Castiel didn’t let either of the brothers know how closely he was scrutinizing Sam, looking for anything out of the ordinary. Castiel noticed Sam would disappear for hours at a time, and he didn’t know where he would go—sometimes he suspected it was to leave Dean and Castiel alone with whatever label they were, but other times Castiel would be lying awake in the middle of the night and would hear the youngest brother slip silently from bed and out the door without waking Dean or, assumedly, Castiel. It made his head spin, because something was wrong, but it was impossible to tell what Sam was doing when he didn’t have the guts to follow him.

So Castiel just sat back, watching for Sam to get worse, and figured that the angels could wait a little longer, and that they wouldn’t be too pissy as long as he ended up stopping “it” at all.

It was just another stop when the three trudged into the comic book store dressed in their suits, Castiel in his trench coat that kept making Dean grin secretly every time he looked at him, and the guy behind the counter regarded them coolly, like he had seen this a million times before, before looking down at what was in front of him.

Castiel glanced around at the comic books curiously, like the books might explain to him the cashier’s dismissive attitude. 

Sam and Dean crossed to the register, where the man was finally looking at them with beady eyes, but Castiel hung back, glancing around the room, obviously bored, the hand in his pocket fiddling with his pack of smokes that Dean was constantly trying to convince him to throw away.

“Uh,” the cashier greeted eloquently, “can I help you?”

“Sure hope so,” Dean said, he and Sam flashing their badges. “Agents DeYoung and Shaw. Back there is our buddy Panozzo. Just need to ask you a few questions.”

“Notice anything weird in the building lately?” Sam asked, going down the list of routine questions, and the cashier continued to look constipated.

“Like what?”

“Well, some other tenants reported flickering lights,” Dean supplied the man, his patience already up. Castiel turned his head enough that he could roll his eyes, though he did understand how it was getting old after spending the entire day running through the same script.

“Uh,” the cashier said again. “I don’t think so. Why?”

“What about noises? Any skittering in the walls? Kind of like rats?” Sam fueled.

The man looked skeptical. “And the FBI is investigating a rodent problem?”

Sam ignored him and asked, “What about cold spots? Feel any sudden drops in temperature?”

Somehow, that was what broke the man. The cashier burst out laughing and then grinned at them excitedly before exclaiming, “I knew it! You guys are LARPing, aren’t you?”

“Excuse me?” Dean demanded. Well, that wasn’t in their usual script.

“You’re fans,” the cashier said.

“Fans of what?” Sam replied curtly, looking at Dean, silently asking if this man was absolutely out of his mind and if they should just start walking away slowly.

“What is LARPing?” Dean asked the man, not even noticing Sam’s stare, frowning in confusion as he tried to wrap his head around the new word.

Castiel just stared at their exchange, entirely confused.

The cashier scoffed at Dean’s question and teased, “Like you don’t know.” They just stared at him, prompting him to continue. “Live-Action Role-Play! And pretty hardcore, too.”

“I’m sorry, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Dean voiced all of their thoughts.

“You’re asking questions like the building is haunted,” the man informed them, rolling his eyes. “Like those guys from the books. What are they called? Uh . . . _Supernatural_! Two brothers and their gay friend with a trench coat use fake IDs with rock aliases, hunt down ghosts, demons, vampires. What are their names? Uh . . . Steven, Dirk, and Calvin? Uh, Sal, Dane, and Castle?”

“Sam, Dean, and Castiel?” Sam supplied slowly, looking stunned.

“I’m bisexual,” Castiel muttered from behind them, scowling at the man. “And it’s an _overcoat_.”

The man completely ignored Castiel in order to snap and point at Sam wildly, grinning. “That’s it!”

“You’re saying this is a book?” Dean urged incredulously, glancing to Sam and Castiel, but they probably all wore the same expression of _what the fuck_.

“ _Books_ ,” the seller corrected impatiently, like they were still playing the LARPing game. “It was a series. Didn’t sell a lot of copies, though. Kind of had more of an underground cult following. Surprised the series didn’t get picked up again after the end of the last book, with the Dean guy finding out his gay best friend loved him before he died.” The man headed around the counter and to a table labeled as a Bargain Bin, and the three of them followed behind him mechanically. “Let’s see. Um . . . Ah, yeah.” The seller shoved a book into Dean’s hands. “That’s the first one, I think.”

Dean turned the book around and read the cover aloud, his face slowly becoming more horrified with each word. “ _Supernatural_ , by Carver Edlund. ‘Along a lonely California highway, a mysterious woman in white lures men to their deaths.’”

Dean’s head snapped up to look at Sam, and Sam snatched the book from his hands, looking at it incredulously. The man threw another book at Castiel, which he barely managed to yank his hands out of his pockets in enough time to catch. “That one is where the trench coat guy comes in,” the man supplied Castiel, and Castiel stared down at the cover in horror, looking at the graphically drawn figure of what might be himself with pants and no shirt on, with a kind exaggeration of his abdominal muscles, his trench coat on and open to show his chest, flowing in an invisible wind behind him. Castiel looked at Dean, horrified.

Sam managed to say, “We’re gonna need all the copies of _Supernatural_ you’ve got.” 

*

“This is fucking insane,” Dean remarked from where he was sprawled on one of the beds, the other covered in miscellaneous books from the _Supernatural_ series. Dean waved the book impatiently, and Sam and Castiel looked up from their table at the window, Castiel frowning at one of his own books while Sam surfed the Internet, looking just as scandalized. “How does this guy know all this stuff?” Dean asked them impatiently.

“You got me,” Sam muttered.

“ _Everything_ is in here,” Dean announced, shaking the book. “I mean _everything_. From the racist truck to—to me having sex. I’m full-frontal in here, dude.” Dean crossed over to the table, throwing the book down in between them, and Castiel considered looking into the pages where Dean was full-frontal. For the case, of course. “How come we haven’t heard of them before?”

“They’re pretty obscure,” Sam informed them. “I mean, almost zero circulation. Uh, started in ’05. The publisher put out a couple dozen before going bankrupt. And, uh, the last one, ‘No Rest for the Wicked’, it, uh—.” Sam made a face and then looked to Castiel. “It ends with you going to Hell, just like the guy said.”

“I reiterate—fucking insane,” Dean, indeed, reiterated. He ducked behind Sam, pushing him out of the way enough that he could scroll through the page he was looking at. “Check it out—there’s actually fans. There’s not many of them, but still. Did you read this?”

“Yeah,” Sam said, looking at Dean, waiting for something to register, and Castiel watched them cautiously.

“Although for fans, they sure do complain a lot,” Dean noted, rolling his eyes. “Listen to this—Simpatico says, ‘The demon story line is trite, clichéd, and overall craptastic’. Yeah, well, screw you, Simpatico.”

“Yeah, well, keep on reading,” Sam told him slowly, torn between grinning and grimacing. “It gets better.”

“There are ‘Sam girls’ and ‘Dean girls’, and you’ve got a _whole_ bunch of fans, Cas, you lucky bastard, and—what’s a ‘slash fan’?” Dean asked.

Sam responded carefully, “As in, ‘Sam-slash-Dean’. Together.”

Dean paused, blinking at the screen, his face blank. “Like . . . _together_ , together?”

“Yeah.”

Dean shivered and said, “They _do_ know we’re brothers, right?”

“Doesn’t seem to matter,” Sam replied.

“Oh, come on. That . . . That’s just sick,” Dean said, pushing away from the laptop in obvious terror. Sam laughed louder, grinning.

“You should have kept going to the Dean-slash-Castiel fans,” Sam teased them, smirking. “Now _that’s_ a loud majority. Apparently you two are star-crossed soul mates and they will let no one tell them otherwise. They even have a cute little couple name for you two— _Destiel_.”

“We’ve got to find this Carver Edlund guy,” Castiel announced, trying to hide his amusement over people actually naming his and Dean’s relationship like a Hollywood couple.

Sam laughed at Castiel’s obvious mixed reaction before saying, “Yeah, that might not be so easy.”

“Why not?” Dean demanded, having not commented at all on the Destiel slash fans, but he snuck a wink to Castiel when he noticed him looking, and Castiel bit back his smile.

Sam answered, “No tax records, no known address. Looks like Carver Edlund is a pen name.”

“Well, _somebody’s_ gotta know who he is,” Dean said, reaching over and grabbing his jacket from the bed. “Let’s get moving.”

*

Thankfully, the publisher was only located a couple of hours away, and Sam, Dean, and Castiel managed to get a meeting with her for that day. The woman was young, attractive, with thick-framed spectacles and an obviously skeptical opinion of their intentions under the pretense of wanting to write a series of articles about the books to bring them back to the popularity they deserved. Castiel had received unhappy frowns from both Sam and Dean when he pulled that excuse out of his ass, but he still offered no apology as they followed the woman back to her office.

“So you published the Supernatural books?” Sam asked her, quickening his pace ever-so-slightly to catch up.

“Yep,” the woman responded happily, leading them into her office and gesturing for them to sit down as she sighed, practically swooning. “Yeah. Gosh. These books . . . You know, they never got the attention they deserved. All anybody anymore wants to read is that romance crap. You know— _Dr. Sexy, M.D._?” She scoffed. “Please.”

Dean looked thoroughly offended. Sam nearly choked on a laugh.

“Right,” he said, clearing his throat. “Well, we’re hoping that our article can . . . shine a light on an underappreciated series.”

The publisher immediately perked up, a grin lighting her face. “Yeah, yeah, because, you know, if we got a little bit of good press then maybe we could start publishing again!”

“No, no, no, no. God, no,” Dean said, and then froze when he realized what he said and then laughed it off weakly as the publisher’s eyes narrowed, her expression marred with distrust as Dean tried to free himself from the hole he had dug himself into. “I mean, why—why would you want to do that? You know, it’s, uh, such a complete series, what with Cas, uh, Cas _tiel_ going to Hell and all.”

The publisher made a sound like she was about to burst into tears and then slapped her hands over her mouth, her eyes widening. “Oh my god, that was one of my favorite ones! Castiel was so—so _strong_ and _sad_ and _brave_. And then Lilith told Dean that _Castiel loved him_! I mean, oh my god! I _cried_! The Destiel shippers were _devastated_ , but it was the _best_ scene, like . . .”

The publisher waved her hands, trying to conjure the words from thin air, and Dean and Castiel exchanged wary looks, Castiel looking away quickly and shuffling awkwardly on his feet. Sam’s face was poker straight, but Castiel was sure he was hysterically laughing on the inside.

“It was so sad when Dean started crying,” the publisher mourned, her hand over her heart. “I mean, some of the best parts were when they’d cry. You know, like in—in ‘Heart’, when Sam had to kill Madison!” Sam flinched. “I mean, she was the first person since Jessica that he really loved! Oh God, it killed me! And in ‘Home’, when Dean had to call John and ask him for help!” The publisher sniffled, still clinging to her heart. “I don’t even want to talk about the way Castiel cried in ‘All Hell Breaks Loose: Part Two’ when he was dealing with the demon, and the crossroads demon wanted him to offer Dean’s soul, too! The way he _begged_ it to take just him! Oh my _god_!”

Castiel stiffened. Dean and Sam’s heads snapped to look at him simultaneously, stunned.

“Gosh,” the publisher murmured, wiping at her eyes, “if only real men were so open and in touch with their feelings.”

Castiel kind of wished he could wither away into the floor boards and die, but he figured it would be a little hard to explain why he felt secondhand embarrassment so strongly, so he just avoided looking at Sam and Dean instead, nervously shifting his weight on his feet.

The publisher seemed to take their silence as confusion, because she straightened up, looking around at the three of them. “How do you I know you three are legit, hmm?”

“Oh, trust me,” Dean told her sarcastically. “We’re legit.”

“Well, I don’t want any smart-ass articles making fun of my boys,” she said defensively, puffing up, her eyes snapping in between Dean, Sam, and Castiel. Sam started stammering, trying to reassure her they were the real deal, and she looked even more unconvinced by the second as Dean joined in. Castiel cleared his throat, making his presence obvious for the first time since he talked in the lobby, and the publisher looked at him.

“We are actually big fans,” Castiel told her, shooting Dean a dark look when he opened his mouth, and Dean immediately stopped speaking. The publisher looked at Castiel in surprise.

“You’ve read the books?” she demanded skeptically. Castiel nodded.

“Cover to cover,” he promised her, looking to Sam and Dean. “All three of us have. We’ve even LARPed.”

Sam rolled his eyes so hard that Castiel wondered if they were going to explode, and Dean just slowly closed his eyes, like he was considering just shooting Castiel with a tranquilizer to put him to sleep until the end of the conversation to make this whole ride a little more smoother.

But it was working. The publisher was immediately more perceptive, her eyes sparkling.

“What’s the year and model of the car?” she quizzed them, jutting out her chin bravely.

“It’s a 1967 Chevy Impala,” Dean immediately responded, flashing her his best charming smile.

“What’s May 2nd?”

“My—uh, Sam’s birthday,” Sam told her.

“January 24th is Dean’s,” Dean offered.

“Sam’s score on the LSAT?” she threw the brothers a gutter ball, her eyebrows up. Dean and Castiel looked nervously to Sam, who looked entirely at a loss.

“One . . .” he said slowly, and then frowned a little, “seventy-four?”

“Dean’s favorite song?”

“It’s a tie,” Dean purred, smirking. “Between Zep’s ‘Ramble On’ and ‘Traveling Riverside Blues’.”

“When did Castiel fall in love with Dean?” the publisher demanded, and Dean’s eyes flew wide open. Sam looked nervously to Castiel, who fidgeted, and the publisher immediately looked at him, figuring he would be the answerer. And, he guessed he had to be. It wasn’t as if the others would know. This visit was turning into some horrible confession of all of Castiel’s secrets, and Castiel felt the back of his neck getting warm.

Castiel cleared his throat nervously before mumbling, “Instantly.”

Sam’s eyebrows rose and Dean’s eyes widened even further, but the publisher just grinned excitedly, because she knew all of their answers were correct, and she sunk down to perch at the edge of her desk, acting as if she hadn’t just completely turned the world upside down.

“Okay,” she cheered, grinning. “What do you want to know?”

“What’s Carver Edlund’s real name?” Sam asked her, since Dean was a little too busy staring at Castiel, looking like he had just sucker punched him with a freshly caught halibut. The publisher sighed.

“Oh, no,” she said, looking sheepish. “I—no, sorry, I can’t do that.”

“We just want to talk to him,” Sam pleaded with her, throwing in the puppy-dog eyes that no one could ever resist. “We just want to get the _Supernatural_ story in his own words.”

“He’s very private,” the publisher told them like she was telling a dirty little secret. “It’s like Salinger.”

Castiel somehow refrained from rolling his eyes.

“Please,” Sam pleaded. “Like Ca—Calvin said, we’re, uh . . .”

Dean and Castiel watched in half-horror as Sam started unbuttoning his shirt, and he pulled it down to reveal the anti-possession tattoo over his heart. The publisher’s eyes widened in surprise.

“We’re big fans,” Sam deadpanned, giving Dean and Castiel pointed looks. Dean shot Castiel a tired look before following Sam’s lead, and Castiel did the same, until they were all three showing the publisher their tattoos.

Castiel felt extremely objectified when she licked her lips.

“Awesome,” she remarked, looking overjoyed, as they buttoned their shirts again. She glanced around before saying, “You know what? I got one, too.”

And then she turned and hiked up her skirt, and Castiel wasn’t sure if he should start laughing or if he should be horrified.

“Whoa,” Dean remarked a little shakily. “You really are a fan.”

She giggled, turning back around and fixing her skirt, a new kind of warmth in her eyes. “Okay,” she said as she reached over for a pad of paper and started scribbling on it with a pen. “His name’s Chuck Shurley. And he’s a genius, so don’t piss him off.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Dean told her, taking the address and glancing at it before smiling at her impatiently. “Thank you for your time.”

“Wait,” she called as they were walking from the room, grinning. “You guys mention you LARP, right?”

“Yes,” Castiel answered for them nervously. “Why?”

“You two,” the publisher said, pointing between Dean and Castiel, “should _totally_ cosplay as Dean and Castiel and send it to me to put on the website. Your eye color is _perfect_ for him,” she told Castiel, and then looked to Dean. “I pictured Dean’s eyes as a little more green, but yours could work.”

Dean looked offended again, but Castiel just smiled and thanked her, gesturing for Sam and Dean to follow him as they made their escape from the building. They didn’t say anything until they were slipping into the Impala, shutting the doors solidly behind them, and they all paused for a long moment of silence, all of them still feeling shock from what had just happened.

“We need to talk about that crossroads deal later,” Dean announced to no one in particular, but definitely only to Castiel. Castiel grimaced as Dean started the car, turning the music volume to a reasonable amount and pulling out of the spot, his eyes flickering to Castiel’s as he looked out the back windshield. Castiel looked away.

“Maybe,” Castiel said.

They drove the rest of the way in silence.

*

“You’re sure this is the place?” Sam asked for the third time in the last thirty seconds, not looking convinced even when Dean shoved the address into his face. Sam took to the ramshackle building with trepidation.

Dean and Castiel ignored him as they climbed out of the car, letting the door close simultaneously behind them, and Sam followed even if he didn’t look as determined. The three of them crossed the street to the building, and they shared a soulful look before they figured what the hell, and Dean leaned forward and pressed the doorbell, and they listened to it ring loudly through the house. Castiel leaned forward as he heard a groan and shuffling movement, and he took a step away from the door, putting his hands in the pockets of his leather jacket.

A guy nearly a whole foot shorter than Sam and smelling like whiskey worse than Dean on a bad day pulled open the door, squinting against the sunlight. He was untidy, unshaven, and was wearing a robe over his pajamas, which had a coffee stain on the front of them. He looked between the three of them, seeming a little intimidated.

“You Chuck Shurley?” Dean demanded incredulously, judging Chuck with his eyes.

“The Chuck Shurley who wrote the _Supernatural_ books?” Sam supplied earnestly, staring down at the man.

Chuck blinked once, slowly. “Maybe,” he finally responded. “Why?”

“I’m Dean,” Dean introduced. “This is Sam, and that’s Cas. The ones you’ve been writing about.”

Chuck closed the door.

Dean scowled before ringing the doorbell again, letting his finger press down and making it let out a long, loud, irritating sound. Chuck made an annoyed noise on the other side of the door before ripping it back open again, his hair looking a little wilder, his eyes slightly more sober.

“Look, uh . . . I appreciate your enthusiasm,” Chuck told them honestly, sounding as if he was speaking to children. “Really, I do. It’s always . . . nice to hear from the fans. But, uh, for your own good, I strongly suggest you get a life.”

Chuck moved to close the door again, but Dean’s hand shot out, stopping it.

“See, here’s the thing,” Dean said, his patience obviously gone. “We _have_ a life. You’ve been using it to write your books.”

Dean shoved the door open the rest of the way and stormed into the house, Chuck skittering backwards nervously. Sam and Castiel shared an aghast expression before following behind him, Castiel softly and carefully closing the door behind him as Chuck gaped at them, his jaw practically touching his toes at their audacity.

“Now, wait a minute,” Chuck said, indignant. “Now, this isn’t funny.”

“Damn straight, it’s not funny,” Dean countered.

“Look, we just want to know how you’re doing it,” Sam told Chuck peacefully, shooting his brother a look, but Dean just ignored him.

Chuck cried, “I’m not doing anything!”

“Are you a hunter?” Dean demanded.

“What? No. I’m a writer.”

“Then how do you know so much about demons?” Dean advanced on Chuck, and Chuck scurried backwards until his knees caught on the couch and he fell down onto it, his eyes wide in terror as he looked around at the three men who had forced their way into his home, and Castiel felt a pang of pity for the poor guy. “How do you know about Tulpas, and changelings?”

“Is this some kind of _Misery_ thing?” Chuck demanded, and then his eyes filled with terror and sorrow. “Oh, God, it is, isn’t it? It’s a _Misery_ thing!”

“What?” Dean demanded, blinking, “No, it’s not some _Misery_ thing. Believe me, we’re not fans!”

“Well then what do you want?” Chuck demanded, terrified.

“I’m Sam,” Sam introduced them for the second time. “That’s Dean, and that’s Castiel.”

“Sam and Dean and Castiel are fictional characters,” Chuck argued. “I made them up! They’re not _real_!”

Dean made an annoyed sound before he grabbed a handful of Chuck’s bath robe and pulled him to his feet, pulling the poor guy with him as he stormed from the house, and Sam and Castiel followed behind as Dean planted himself and Chuck at the trunk of the Impala, Chuck watching with wide eyes as Dean let him go to open it and pull out the false bottom, showing him the arsenal of weapons. Chuck’s jaw dropped before he snapped it shut again.

“Are those real guns?” he asked weakly.

“Yup,” Dean said. “This is real rock salt, and those are real fake IDs.”

“Well, I got to hand it to you guys—you really are my number one fans,” Chuck said, laughing nervously. “That’s—that’s awesome. So, I, uh, I think I’ve got some posters in the house.”

“Chuck, stop,” Dean said as Chuck started to move away, and then Chuck flinched like Dean had roundhouse kicked him in the jaw.

“Please, wait, please don’t hurt me,” Chuck pleaded with him.

Castiel’s patience ran up. He pushed Dean out of the way, sending him stumbling, so that he could be face to face with Chuck, and Chuck looked exceedingly more nervous, but Castiel didn’t bother to be offended that Chuck would think that he would hurt him. Castiel looked down at Chuck with squinted eyes.

“How much do you know?” Castiel demanded. “Do you know about the angels? Or Lilith breaking the seals?”

Chuck blinked. And then he blinked again, her nervousness turning to shock. “Wait a minute—how do you know about that?”

“The question is how do _you_ ,” Castiel replied.

“Because I wrote it?” Chuck responded, the ‘duh’ silent but implied.

“You kept writing?” Sam demanded from behind Castiel, and Chuck nodded.

“Yeah, even after the publisher went bankrupt, but those books never came out,” Chuck said, surprise the dominant emotion on his face now as he looked around at the three men, his mind obviously churning through the information. “Okay, wait a minute. This is some kind of joke, right? Did that—did Phil put you up to this?”

“Nice to meet you,” Castiel said, his eyes flashing. “My name is Castiel Novak. That is Dean Winchester, and his brother Sam.”

“The last names were never in the books,” Chuck said, and then went completely pale, sickly pale. “I never told anyone about that. I never even wrote them down.”

Castiel and Chuck stared at each other for a long moment, and then Chuck swallowed heavily.

“You guys should come in,” Chuck said, and then all but sprinted toward the house, Castiel and the brothers following behind him dutifully, not even glancing at each other, all of them a little whiplashed by the events of the last ten minutes. Castiel closed the door behind them again.

They found Chuck in the kitchen, pouring himself a large glass of whiskey that he immediately gulped down in the entirety, placing the glass in the sink. He turned around and spotted Castiel, Sam, and Dean watching him, and he jumped.

“Oh God,” Chuck said miserably. “You’re still here.”

“Yup,” Dean replied, and then rolled his eyes.

“You’re not a hallucination.” Chuck seemed to be talking to himself a lot more than he was speaking to them, but Castiel wasn’t entirely sure they should let him have this existential crisis right when they really needed to talk to him.

But all Dean said was, “Nope.”

Chuck took a deep breath, straightening up. “Well, there’s only one explanation. Obviously, I’m a god.”

“You’re not a god,” Sam deadpanned.

“How else do you explain it?” Chuck demanded, frowning at Sam. “I write things and then they come to life. Yeah, no, I’m definitely a god. A cruel, cruel, capricious god. The things I put you through—the physical beatings alone.”

“Yeah, we’re still in one piece,” Dean replied cautiously, sensing the mental breakdown and treading a little lighter.

“I killed your father,” Chuck continued like they weren’t even there, growing more and more horrified. “I burned your mother alive. And then I put Sam through the whole horrific deal again with Jessica. All for what? All for the sake of literary symmetry.”

“Chuck?” Sam asked, obviously as sure as Castiel that they were totally losing the writer.

Chuck looked at Castiel, horrified, before he whispered, “Holy shit, I made a wendigo _eat_ _your family_.”

“Chuck,” Castiel said, but Chuck just shook his head, leaning back against the counter.

“I toyed with your lives, your emotions, for . . . entertainment,” Chuck groaned.

“You didn’t toy with us, Chuck, okay?” Dean said. “You didn’t _create_ us.”

“Did you really have to live through the bugs?” Chuck suddenly whispered.

“Yeah,” Dean and Sam replied.

“What about the ghost ship?”

“Yeah,” Castiel said, flinching at the memory of Bela Talbot and remembering how they left her to die, wondering if she had been one of the souls under his knife, if it had been when he was too lost to think straight. He wondered if she might have recognized him, and if it had scared her.

Castiel reached up and rubbed his face.

Chuck groaned. “I’m so sorry. I mean, horror is one thing, but to be forced to live bad writing . . . If I would have known it was real, I would have done another pass, I swear.”

“Chuck, you are not a god!” Dean thundered.

“We think you’re probably just psychic,” Sam elaborated, nodding.

“No,” Chuck said. “If I were psychic, you think I’d be writing? Writing is hard.”

“It seems that somehow you’re just . . . focused on our lives.”

“Yeah, like laser-focused,” Dean muttered, frowning. “Are you working on anything right now?”

Chuck’s expression just suddenly disappeared, going entirely stoic. “Holy crap.”

“What?” Sam asked.

Chuck crossed the room hurriedly to grab at a set of papers, trying to collect them into a pile with shaking hands. “The, uh, latest book? It’s, uh—it’s kind of weird.”

“Weird how?” Castiel asked.

“It’s very Vonnegut.”

“ _Slaughterhouse-Five_ Vonnegut or _Cat’s Cradle_ Vonnegut?” Dean asked him cautiously.

Castiel and Sam both looked at Dean in surprise. He shot them a smartass glare, one that obviously read “of course I read, asshole” before focusing his attention back on Chuck.

Chuck shook his head, looking just as surprised by Dean’s literature knowledge as the rest of them, but he just responded, “It’s Kilgore Trout Vonnegut. I wrote _myself_ into it. I wrote myself, at my house . . . confronted by my characters.”

Castiel stared at Chuck for a long moment before he said, “Chuck? We’re gonna need this new book.”

*

Later that night, sitting in a Laundromat, Dean poured over the pages of the manuscript Chuck had given them before they had left his home a few hours ago, a frown pulling his lips down as Sam pulled open the door of the dryer, Castiel sitting on the machine next to Dean’s chair, reading over his shoulder while pretending not to—even if it was a moot point, because it mentioned his snooping in the manuscript. Dean shot him a look, and Castiel sent him a sheepish smile.

“I’m sitting in a Laundromat, reading about myself sitting in a Laundromat reading about myself. My head hurts,” Dean muttered, sighing.

“There’s got to be something this guy’s not telling us,” Sam insisted, turning to toss his darks into the dryer. Dean looked back to the pages.

“‘Sam tossed his gigantic darks into the machine’,” Dean read impassively. “‘He was starting to have doubts about Chuck, about whether he was telling the whole truth.’”

“Stop it,” Sam said.

“‘Stop it, Sam said’,” Dean read, and then smirked. “Guess what you do next.”

Sam turned his back to Dean, obviously not in the mood. Dean, of course, read on anyway.

“‘Sam turned his back on Dean, his face brooding and pensive.’ I mean, I don’t know how he’s doing it, but this guy is doing it. I can’t see your face, but those are definitely your ‘brooding and pensive’ shoulders.”

Sam sighed.

“You just thought that I’m a dick,” Dean exclaimed, offended.

Sam turned back to look at them, suddenly looking impressed. “The guy’s good.”

Castiel burst out laughing.

*

When they arrived at Chuck’s the next morning, he was waiting for them. He let them in and lead them to the living room before starting to pace a trench in the floor, looking like he was thinking hard enough about something that Castiel half expected smoke to start pouring out of his ears. In his hands were more papers.

“So,” Castiel prompted, “you wrote another chapter?”

“This was all so much easier before you were real,” Chuck groaned.

“We can take it,” Dean assured him, spreading his hands. “Just spit it out.”

“You especially are not going to like this,” Chuck told Dean nervously.

“I didn’t like losing Cas,” Dean replied stoically, and Castiel looked over at him in surprise, but Dean didn’t even seem to register what he had said. Castiel spotted Sam rolling his eyes in his peripheral vision.

Chuck hesitated for only one more second before he ripped the Band-Aid off. “It’s Lilith. She’s coming for Sam.”

“Coming to kill him?” Dean demanded, unconsciously shifting closer to his brother.

“When?” Sam asked.

“Tonight,” Chuck replied.

“She’s just gonna show up? Here?” Dean responded, looking between Sam and Chuck, obviously not understanding why they weren’t as upset over the news as he was.

Chuck sat down at his desk, pulling on a pair of reading glasses and squinting at the page anyway. “Uh,” Chuck said, and then cleared his throat before he read: “‘Lilith patted the bed seductively. Unable to deny his desire, Sam succumbed, and then sank into the throes of fiery demonic passion.’”

 _Fiery demonic passion._ Castiel barely managed to contain himself.

Sam couldn’t—he burst out laughing. “You’re kidding me, right?”

“You think this is funny?” Dean snapped, obviously stressing.

“You don’t?” Sam responded, shaking his head. “I mean, come on. ‘Fiery demonic passion’?”

“It’s just a first draft,” Chuck protested weakly.

“Wait, wait, wait, wait,” Dean said, throwing his hands up to stop all talking. “Lilith is a little girl.”

“No,” Chuck said. “This time she’s a, uh, ‘comely dental hygienist from Bloomington, Indiana.’”

“Great,” Dean snarled sarcastically. “Perfect. So what happens after the . . . ‘fiery demonic’ whatever?”

“I don’t know. It hasn’t come to me yet.”

“Dean,” Sam interjected, looking to his brother. “Look, there’s nothing to worry about. Lilith and me? In bed?”

Dean sent Sam a withering glare and, without looking away from him, asked Chuck, “How does this whole psychic thing of yours work?”

“You mean my process?”

“Yes, your _process_ ,” Dean said, his words dripping with irritation.

“Well, usually, it starts with a headache,” Chuck informed them. “A really bad headache. Aspirin is useless, so . . . I drink. Until I fall asleep. The first time it happened, I thought it was a crazy dream.”

“The first time you dreamt about us, you mean?” Dean clarified.

“It flowed,” Chuck recounted. “It just, it kept flowing. It still does. I—I can’t stop it, really.”

“You can’t seriously _believe_ —” Sam started to object.

“Humor me,” Dean cut off his brother, and Sam sunk out of the argument with an unhappy scowl. Chuck looked in between the two cautiously, and Castiel just watched curiously from the outside of the action, twirling an unlit cigarette in between his fingers.

Chuck held out the manuscript to no one right before Dean turned toward him, saying, “Look, why don’t we just—” Dean took the manuscript from Chuck’s waiting hand without looking at him “—take a look at these and see what’s what.”

Dean looked down at the papers in his hands for a second, stunned, before turning to Chuck.

“You—?” Dean began.

“Knew you were gonna ask for that,” Chuck finished Dean’s sentence, looking exhausted. “Yeah.”

Dean just nodded slowly before reaching out a grabbing a fistful of Sam’s jacket and tugging him with him as he headed for the door, Sam muttering angrily under his breath but following all the same. Castiel shot Chuck a small smile before turning to follow them, but it was when he was turning away that he noticed Chuck’s face fall when he looked at Castiel, his face twisted into something like terror and sorrow and fear, but Castiel pretended like he didn’t notice the look, didn’t let himself wonder why in the world Chuck would be afraid of him before walking out of the house and softly closing the door behind him, following the Winchesters into the Impala.

Castiel pretended like he didn’t notice Chuck watching them drive away from a crack in the front curtains, and Castiel pretended like he didn’t want to know why.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> xo Slang


	18. Next Chapter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unedited. A lot like the episode. Sorry.

Dean figured it would be easy enough to just get out of town, but a roadblock told an entirely different story.

Castiel didn’t like the looks of a convenient bridge closure, obscuring the only way out of town to the highway and, although they didn’t say as much, he could tell by Dean and Sam’s exchanged glances of trepidation as they turned around and headed back into town, all of them uncertainly quiet until Dean pulled up in front of a diner and they filed into it, Dean’s eyes frantically scanning over the chapter with a furrowed brow like he was solving a difficult algebraic equation.

Dean decided on opposite day, but the universe had other ideas.

The story said Castiel ordered water, so he ordered a Sprite. Water came anyway.

“Uh,” Castiel said, looking down at his drink nervously, but Dean and Sam were already bickering.

“This whole thing is ridiculous,” Sam stated, frowning.

“ _Lilith_ is ridiculous?” Dean countered, in probably just as good of a mood.

“The idea of me hooking up with her is.”

“Right,” Dean snorted. “’Cause something like that can _never_ happen.”

 _Well_ , Castiel thought, _looks like Sam slept with Ruby._

Sam looked like he wanted to send back a retort but, remembering the story where the two of them fought, his face contorted until his expression was controlled. He leaned into the table, looking across at his brother, while Castiel continued to nervously swirl his drink around the cup, glancing sideways at Dean, hoping he would get the hint, but the brothers were in a bubble that an apocalypse couldn’t break.

Castiel winced. Bad analogy.

“Dean, for the first time, we have warning that Lilith is close,” Sam told him.

“So?”

“So,” Sam continued, stressing the word, his eyebrows raised, “we’ve got the jump on her. If we know when she’s coming, we know where she’s—this is an opportunity.”

“Are you—?” Dean looked like he was going to pop a blood vessel to keep himself from being angry, but he took in a lungful of air and managed to say in a measured voice, “It frustrates me when you say such reckless things.”

“Well it frustrates me when you’d rather hide than fight,” Sam snapped, not nearly as controlled.

Dean’s eye twitched. Castiel considered throwing his water at the both of them in a desperate distraction but, thankfully, the waitress made her appearance, balancing their meals on her arms and smiling pleasantly. The brothers immediately quieted, and Castiel breathed out the breath he had been holding.

“Cobb salad for you,” the waitress sang, placing the food in front of Sam. “Turkey club for you. And the tofu veggie burger for you.”

“Thank you,” Dean told her, and then waited for her to leave before leaning in close to Sam, his eyes narrowing. Castiel took a big bite of his sandwich, not knowing if the table was about to go flying any minute from the brothers’ feud, and he barely managed to swallow when he realized that it wasn’t a turkey club. “It’s not hiding,” Dean hissed, “it’s being smart. It’s picking your battles. This is a battle that we are not ready to fight.” Dean took a hulking bite of his burger and his eyes widened. “Oh my god, this is delicious. Tofu is amazing.”

Castiel barely managed to open his mouth to finally tell them about the wrong (or, rather, correct) orders before the waitress appeared, looking flustered.

“I’m so sorry, I gave you the bacon cheeseburger by mistake,” she told Dean, snatching up his plate before scurrying away. Dean blinked, stunned, and Sam scowled.

“The same thing happened to me with the water,” Castiel finally shared with them.

“Way to let us know, Cas,” Dean mumbled, frowning angrily.

Castiel was halfway torn between just throwing his hands up and giving up or punching Dean in the face.

*

“Dude, this place charges by the hour,” Sam groaned as Dean pulled up to one of the sleaziest motels Castiel had ever seen, which very strongly said something about it. Dean shoved the room key into his brother’s hand before starting to lead them down the sidewalk, and Sam and Castiel followed behind reluctantly.

“Yeah, well, the book says Lilith finds you at the Red Motel,” Dean replied, and then pointed to the motel’s sign, which read _Toreador Motel_. “Hence the, uh, hooker inn. Opposite day, remember?”

Sam sent Castiel a helpless look, like he was expecting him to stand in the middle of it and tell Dean that Sam was a genius, but Castiel wasn’t really sure which side to take, and he was frankly getting sick and tired of Dean’s snippy attitude, so he said nothing.

The door looked kind of like the outside of the motel—so, like herpes and a guaranteed disappointing lay.

Dean threw his bag on one of the beds and pulled out a handful of hex bags from the side compartment, and then began casually placing them against the room. Castiel and Sam exchanged yet another look, this one looking even more exhausted, before Castiel turned to look at the infuriating man pacing around the room.

“What are you doing?” Castiel demanded.

“Couple of hex bags to Lilith-proof the room,” Dean grunted, placing the last one outside of the bathroom.

“So, what, I’m just supposed to hole up here all night?” Sam replied.

“Exactly,” Dean said. “No research, either. I don’t care what you do—use the Magic Fingers or watch Casa Erotica on Pay-Per-View if that’s what you want.”

Dean grabbed Sam’s bag roughly out of his brother’s hands and pulled the laptop out in a quick and easy movement, looking up and smiling angelically at his brother when he tucked it under his arm, and Sam groaned and protested, but Dean would hear nothing of it. Castiel hovered in the back of the room, not interfering if he could help it, and the practice of half a million foster homes had really helped his ability to become invisible.

“What are you gonna do?” Sam finally demanded, frustrated.

“Well,” Dean said, pulling out the chapter Chuck had given them and skimmed through it before pointing to a page. “The pages say that I spend all day riding around in the Impala. So I’m gonna go park her. Behave yourself, will you? Watch some porn. Don’t do homework for once. Relax.”

Sam looked like he could have punched the nearest wall, but he didn’t bother trying to argue as Dean continued to smile angelically and tugged Castiel from the room by his wrist, not nearly as invisible as he thought, and Castiel paused uncertainly before exiting the room, knowing Dean’s absence would be the perfect chance to talk to Sam and try to figure out why the angels wanted him there, but Dean gave one more solid tug and he was stumbling behind him.

“He’ll be fine,” Dean snorted, rolling his eyes. “He’ll throw a tantrum and then realize I’m right.”

“Lilith is dangerous,” Castiel said like Dean wasn’t aware, but there was always this terror that turned to lava under his skin when he said her name, thinking about when the demon had looked at him with so much pity and said, _I hope, for your sake, they kill you quickly_. “I’m not as confident about leaving him alone.”

“He’ll be fine,” Dean said again, and Castiel was sure he was only repeating it in an attempt to make himself believe it. He unlocked the Impala and climbed in, Castiel following reluctantly after. “We won’t be gone long.”

“Was I with you in the text?”

Dean didn’t answer. It was as good of an answer.

Castiel groaned. “What happened to opposite day?”

“It’s opposite enough,” Dean argued amicably, a grin working onto his lips despite himself.

Castiel made sure Dean could see him when he rolled his eyes at him.

Neither of them were paying attention to see the majority of the motel sign burn out as they pulled onto the main road.

*

After a ten minute drive and a frantic, shameless make-out session in the front seat that was definitely seen by too many innocent eyes, Dean locked the Impala and followed Castiel across the street after checking the door, Castiel already standing on the opposite side of the street, checking the street sign and the surroundings and trying to get his bearings in a town as forgettable as all of the ones that came before it.

Dean had barely reached Castiel’s side of the street before he yelled, “Hey!”

Castiel didn’t even have the chance to turn around fast enough to hear the squeal of car tires, and then a thud.

“Dean?” Castiel yelled, turning fast, in just enough time to see two teenage boys break the back window of the Impala—they met his eyes, spooked, and then took off running. Dean laid in the middle of the road, unconscious, a cut on his temple. A soccer mom jumped from the minivan, looking horrified.

“Oh my gosh, I didn’t mean to hit him, he came out of nowhere!” she pleaded to seemingly no one, but Castiel barely heard her. He fell onto his knees next to Dean, automatically reaching to feel for his pulse, and he relaxed when he felt the solid thrum under his fingers.

Just unconscious. That was manageable.

“Dean?” Castiel asked, shaking the man’s shoulder, but Dean was out like a light at the sleazy motel they left Sam at.

“Do you know him?” she demanded to Castiel, looking so shaken. Castiel nodded before the woman was off to the car, pulling open the side door, and a girl of about six hopped out of the car, looking confused. “Should I call the police? What do I do?”

“Let’s wait for him to wake up,” Castiel told her, feeling just as stunned and confused by this entire situation as she seemed to be. “He’s not going to press charges or anything, if that’s what your thinking. I barely think he’ll care. He’ll probably have a headache.”

“Are you a doctor?” she demanded.

“Uh,” Castiel said. “Yes.”

She looked relieved. Castiel didn’t have the heart or the energy to tell her that he was lying, instead casted one more uneasy look at Dean before standing up, all of them still parked and gathered in the middle of the practically unpopulated street, the mother and daughter know kneeling next to Dean, the mother horrified and the girl curious.

Castiel had more than once considered children to be tiny little psychopaths. He somehow would have thought that a small child would be slightly terrified about their mother having run over another human being, but this little girl was looking at Dean like he was about to tell her the sound that an unconscious man makes in comparison to wolves or sheep or something.

Castiel glanced back at the Impala, an impulse, and maybe one day he would understand the reasons why Dean would leap in front of traffic.

“Shit,” Castiel muttered to him, grimacing at the state of the Impala. “Dean’s gonna be pissed.”

“What?” the mother asked from behind him, and Castiel turned around with an easy smile.

“Nothing,” he said.

She had dark hair, and large dangling earrings, and Castiel had a feeling that he and Dean would probably laugh about this later when he was done having a seizure over his car and the story stopped coming true despite an attempt to make it opposite. The poor woman looked terrified, like Castiel was about to send her to jail for hitting Dean with her car. While the protective part of him wanted her to be sorely apologetic for hurting Dean, the practical part of him couldn’t help but to think that maybe Dean kind of deserved it for being a bit of a dick lately.

Castiel wasn’t sure if it was karma or prophecy that had done this, but he didn’t quite like the sound of either of them.

“I think he’s waking up!” the woman called, and Castiel turned on his heel to find Dean’s eyes blinking open, his face bewildered and scrunched from the brightness of the street. “Oh my god,” the woman said, her hands hovering helplessly over Dean. She told him, “Just take it easy, you’re gonna be okay.”

And Dean replied in a mumble, “Stars.”

Castiel looked at the woman’s earrings and remembered Chuck writing that Dean saw stars, and he almost groaned out loud.

“What?” the woman asked, confused, but Dean ignored her, blinking rapidly and trying to raise his head, looking dazed. “I’m so sorry, I just didn’t see you. Are you okay?”

Dean sat up and groaned.

“And sorry about . . . you know,” the woman said nervously, and then gestured to her daughter, who was standing just behind her and looking at Dean with wide eyes. “My daughter, she’s going through a doctor phase.”

“What are you talking about?” Dean slurred, and he turned his face in a direction that Castiel finally managed to see it.

Where there had been a bleeding wound on his temple, there were now a cluster of pink flowery Band-Aids, definitely the works of a little girl wanting to play doctor. Dean blinked, confused, reaching up to touch his head before calling a little louder, “Cas?”

“Right here,” Castiel assured him, kneeling down next to him on his left side, and Dean swung his head over to look at him, his pupils a little dilated but he seemed to be mostly all the way conscious, enough that he was aware of his surroundings. Castiel smiled at laid his hand on his shoulder. “You stay put for a minute, alright? No more jumping into traffic.”

“You’re lucky your doctor friend was here,” the soccer mom told him, smiling politely over to Castiel. “He says you’re going to be fine.”

“Yeah,” Dean grated out, managing to hook one corner of his lips into a crooked, cocky smirk. “He’s a regular Doctor Sexy.”

Castiel rolled his eyes, smiling to the woman, before he nudged Dean, offering his hand to help him up, and Dean took it, allowing Castiel to pull him onto his unsteady feet. Castiel reached out and held Dean while he tried to get his bearings, but they both had had their share of head injuries, so Dean was bouncing back in no time. He weakly patted Castiel’s arm in a silent thanks before taking a step away, his eyes automatically going to his car, like a mother’s eyes finding their child, and Castiel would have been jealous if he wasn’t so used to it.

“Oh no,” Dean whispered, horrified, when he spotted the shattered window. “My baby.”

Castiel took the time to assure the woman and her child that Dean would be fine, that he would make sure he got home safely and that no, he didn’t need her name or insurance information, that they would be no trouble to her at all, and he watched them leave cautiously. Castiel turned back to look at Dean in enough time to watch him look in the side mirror and spot the Band-Aids, and he scowled as he reached up and tugged one of them off.

“Are you okay?” Castiel asked when they were finally alone, and Dean’s response was an answering pout.

Dean abandoned the Band-Aids after he found one caught in his hair, gritting his teeth and looking a mixture of confused and angry that immediately reminded Castiel of a frustrated puppy, and he had to bite his tongue almost hard enough to draw blood to keep himself from laughing.

“Uh,” Castiel said. “There’s tarp for the window in the trunk.”

The scowl that Dean sent him was soaked in acid.

“We have to see Chuck,” Dean told him, his eyes flashing.

*

Chuck entered his house about forty minutes later holding a plastic bag filled with beer and looking like he knew full well that there was a possibility he was about to get his ass kicked.

“Dean,” he greeted, not seeming surprised at all to find Dean fuming in his living room, despite the fact that Castiel had to spend three minutes trying to pick the decrepit lock on his front door to gain the element of surprise. Dean stared back at Chuck, his eyes narrowed. Castiel just offered him a nervous smile from behind Dean, but Chuck didn’t seem reassured.

“I take it you knew I’d be here,” Dean growled, entirely fed up.

“You look terrible,” Chuck said instead of trying to disagree with Dean, but still kind of managed to make it worse.

“That’s ‘cause I just got hit by a minivan, Chuck.”

“Oh,” Chuck said.

“That it?” Dean demanded, stepping closer to the man angrily. “Every damn thing you write about me comes true, and all you have to say is, ‘oh’?”

“Please don’t yell at me,” Chuck whispered. Dean ignored him.

“Why do I get the feeling there’s something that you’re not telling us?”

“What wouldn’t I be telling you?” Chuck sounded patient, like he was dealing with a small child but, as Castiel watched him put the paper bag down on the kitchen table slowly, Castiel couldn’t help but to think that Chuck just looked sad, exhausted, and a little pathetic.

Somehow, Castiel sympathized with that.

“How you know what you know, for starters,” Dean growled in response, throwing his hands up, and Chuck flinched.

“I don’t know how I know!” Chuck exclaimed back, panicky. “I just do!”

“That’s not good enough!” Dean shouted, before suddenly shoving Chuck against the wall and holding him there, ignoring Castiel’s indignant yell of his name. “How the hell are you doing this?”

“Dean,” Anna said from behind him, “let him go.”

Dean dropped Chuck out of pure surprise. Chuck slid out from Dean’s touch, staring at Anna in surprise, but no one looked as surprised as Dean did, looking into the angel that he had last seen losing hope in Castiel behind Bobby’s house. Castiel stared at her, unfathomable, remembering the last words she spoke to him, and he suddenly wasn’t so happy to see her as he normally may have been.

“This man is to be protected,” Anna told Dean patiently, sounding like she was quoting a textbook.

“Why?” Dean demanded.

Anna smiled and said, “He’s a Prophet of the Lord.”

“You’re Anna, aren’t you?” Chuck asked him, looking torn between binge drinking and falling to kiss her feet.

“it’s an honor to meet you, Chuck,” she told the man, inclining her head in his direction. “I . . . admire your work.”

She picked up a spare book lying on the kitchen table and started to rifle through it, seeming completely oblivious to the three men staring at her around the room. Dean seemed to realize what she had said, because he suddenly slipped from surprised at seeing Anna appear out of nowhere and toward incredulity.

“Whoa, whoa, what?” Dean asked before pointing at Chuck. “This guy, a prophet? Come on, he’s—he’s practically a Penthouse Forum writer.”

Anna didn’t even look up from the pages. Dean turned to Chuck.

“Did you know about this?”

Chuck didn’t respond at first—he took his time to stumble over to his armchair, collapse into it, and swallow large mouthfuls of the whiskey bottle next to him without bothering to get a glass.

“I, uh, might have dreamt about it,” Chuck told Dean when he was finished.

“And you didn’t tell us?”

“It was too preposterous,” Chuck argued, and Castiel couldn’t exactly blame him. “Not to mention arrogant. I mean, writing yourself into the story is one thing, but as a prophet? That’s M. Night-level douchiness.”

Chuck finished his tirade before gulping down another mouthful of whiskey, looking like he was in a lot of pain.

Dean turned to Anna and demanded, “This is the guy who decides our fate?”

“He isn’t deciding anything,” Anna corrected. “He’s a mouthpiece—a conduit for the inspired word.”

“The word? The word of _God_?” Castiel demanded incredulously, and Anna barely turned to acknowledge him. “What, like the _New_ New Testament?”

“One day, these books—they’ll be known as the Winchester Gospel.”

“You got to be kidding me,” Dean, Castiel, and Chuck all said at the same time.

Anna looked startled, and started to smile while she said, “I am not kidding you.”

“If you’d three please excuse me for a minute,” Chuck said before clutching the bottle to his chest and disappearing up the stairs. Castiel wondered if he was even going to bother to return.

“Him?” Dean demanded to Anna, his eyebrows rising skeptically. “Really?”

“You should’ve seen Luke,” she sighed.

“Why’d he get tapped?”

“I don’t know how prophets are chosen,” she answered truthfully. “The order comes from high up on the celestial chain of command.”

“How high?” Castiel asked.

“Very.”

“Well, whatever,” Dean said, shaking it off. “How do we get around this?”

“Around what?”

“The Sam-Lilith love connection,” Dean clarified, looking irritated, and Anna nodded like _Oh, yes, that_. “How do we stop it from happening?”

“What the prophet has written can’t be unwritten,” she informed them, shrugging. “As he has seen it, it shall come to pass.”

Anna glanced between Dean and Castiel for a moment before she flickered from the room, leaving them alone on the main floor while Chuck probably hyperventilated and chugged enough whiskey to put himself into a coma upstairs. Dean turned to look at Castiel, his eyebrows raised, and Castiel just managed to give him a clueless shrug.

“We should warn Sam,” Castiel said, and Dean nodded.

They didn’t bother to tell Chuck they were leaving. The figured he would probably already know.

*

“Son of a bitch,” Dean muttered, staring up at the burnt-out sign that now advertised the ‘RE D MOTEL’.

Dean and Castiel made sure the Impala was locked and secured from all possible teenage thieves before Dean burst through the door of the motel, not bothering to knock. Sam looked up from where he was sitting on the bed, his elbows on his knees and his head hanging. He looked up when they walked into the room, seeming surprised to see them, and he looked at the cut on Dean’s forehead with confusion.

“Come on, we’re getting out of here,” Dean urged Sam, gathering up his few unpacked belongings. Sam blinked.

“What?” he asked. “Where?”

“Anywhere, okay?” Dean replied. “Out of this motel, out of this town. I don’t care if we gotta swim, the three of us are getting the hell out.”

Dean suddenly stopped moving, and took a sweep around the room. His head snapped to look at his brother, and his expression was suddenly thunderously angry.

“Dude, where are all the hex bags?”

“I burned them,” Sam told him bluntly.

“You what?”

“Look, if Lilith is coming, which is a big ‘if’—”

“No, no, no,” Dean interrupted his brother, shaking his head and gesturing with his hands. “It’s more than an ‘if’. Chuck is not a psychic—he’s a prophet.”

“What?” Sam demanded, looking at Castiel for an explanation.

“Anna showed up, and apparently Chuck is writing down the word of you two,” Castiel explained the best as he could. Sam looked skeptical.

“Okay.”

“Okay,” Dean echoed. “Let’s get the hell out of here.”

“No.”

Dean looked frustrated as he told his brother sharply, “Lilith is going to slaughter you.”

“Maybe she will,” Sam agreed. “Maybe she won’t.”

“So what? You think you can take her?”

“Only one way to find out, Dean, and I say bring her on.”

“Sam—”

“You think I’ll do it, don’t you? You think I’ll go dark side.”

Castiel was confused, but Dean’s face paled a little, and he suddenly had a feeling that he missed something big.

“Yes, okay?” Dean suddenly shouted at his brother, turning on him, his eyes flashing desperately. “Yes. The way you’ve been acting lately? The things you’ve been doing?” Sam looked startled and Dean laughed sourly. “Oh, I know. How you ripped Alastair apart like it was nothing, like you were swatting a fly. Anna told me all about it.”

“What else did she tell you?”

“Nothing I don’t already know about,” Dean told him, and Castiel’s head spun. “You’ve been using your psychic crap, and you’ve been getting stronger. We just don’t know why, and don’t know how.”

Castiel turned to look at Sam, at his sunken eyes and his pale skin and his greasy hair, and he suddenly felt like he didn’t even know him anymore.

“It’s not what you think,” Sam murmured, breaking.

“Then what is it, Sam?” Dean demanded. “’Cause I’m at a total loss.”

Sam didn’t respond. Dean grabbed the bag from the bed and began for the door, but he stopped when he realized neither Sam nor Castiel were following behind him. He looked back over his shoulder, his eyes mostly on his brother.

“Are you coming or not?” Dean growled.

Sam looked at his brother and said, “No.”

Dean turned back to the door, and Castiel watched in surprised, suddenly so sure that Dean was going to walk straight out and not look back, but then Dean paused at the threshold, not moving a muscle. And then Dean suddenly threw the bag forcefully onto the nearest chair and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him, and neither Sam nor Castiel moved for a long moment.

“I’ll go talk to him,” Castiel murmured, and Sam nodded wordlessly, and Castiel disappeared into the night behind Dean, knowing he wouldn’t go to find him, knowing he was going to leave Sam behind in that motel room and find a quiet place to think, because he was finally beginning to understand why the angels would order him to come back. He finally understood why the angels looked at Sam Winchester and saw him as a danger, a threat.

Sam had torn Alastair apart with his mind. As Castiel had laid dying, Sam had done something that killed a demon with nothing but his own mind, and it had scared an angel enough that they wanted to see his body bloody and broken. The angels didn’t even want Sam to be alive, too afraid of what he might be doing next.

Castiel wondered how. He wondered why.

He wondered if he would ever be able to stop Sam, or if he would have to kill his best friend.

Castiel wandered to the other side of the motel, around the back, and sat down under a tree, burying his head in his hands and trying to breathe in the calm night air.

He knew Sam had been the one to kill Alastair after he had ended his life. Dean had told him that much when he was still in the hospital, having explained how they found him and what they walked in on and his strange revival that even had Anna mystified, but Dean had never told him that. He had never told Castiel that Sam had done it with his _mind_.

_So stop it. Or we will._

Castiel looked up into the darkness.

This changed things.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> xo Slang


	19. Extended Edition

Castiel was still sitting under that tree, ruminating and distressing, when Anna appeared.

“I heard you praying,” she told him when he opened his mouth to protest, already seeming to know what he was going to say. Castiel wasn’t sure how much he liked how well she seemed to understand him, how their camaraderie had grown to the point she knew what he would say. “I figured that you wouldn’t be praying unless you needed to be since, you know, prayer is a sign of faith, and you seem to be having quite a time with that.”

Castiel was entirely not in the mood to deal with a smug angel, especially when his stomach was still churning with the realization of just how far gone Sam was.

“Are you going to help me?” he chose to ask instead of snapping at her, figuring this would at least be simpler to deal with. Her eyebrows rose.

“I’m not sure what I can do,” she answered honestly, sinking down into the grass gracefully, tucking her legs under her, and resting her hands together on her lap. She tilted her head inquiringly as she looked at him, as if sensing something was wrong but not wanting—or needing—to ask, but Castiel wasn’t about to start spilling his guts to a being so hot and cold. It seemed logical that the only supernatural being he should be able to trust would be an angel—but, yet again, when had anything ever been as it seemed?

“You could drag Sam out of here before Lilith shows,” Cas told her through his teeth, his hands fisting tightly. “You could do the same with Dean while you’re at it. Lock them both into the Impala, and drive them off.”

“Without you?” she asked innocently, and smiled.

“Without me,” he gritted through his teeth, not knowing this side of Anna and not liking it.

“It’s a prophecy,” she finally told him, shrugging and leaning back, as if relaxing. She tilted her head back to look up at the sky, but Castiel couldn’t help but to wonder if she was just ignoring his gaze. “I can’t interfere.”

Castiel thought he was composed until he was faced with this moment. He was usually rather good with hiding everything, with smothering his own emotions and doing what needed to be done before all else, but his nerves were running on a short fuse as of late, and his anger followed shortly after. Everything that had been pent up inside of him spilled out—all of his anger and frustration and doubt and fear overwhelmed him, dominated his senses, and Castiel couldn’t help but to lose himself in this neat bout of chaos and illogical thinking.

His voice was low and infuriated when he spoke through his teeth, looking Anna in the eye as he ground out, “You have tested me and thrown me every which way, and I have never asked for anything. Not one damn thing. But now I need your help. If you please.”

A flash of irritation crossed Anna’s face before she settled back into her mask of calm, and she informed him patiently, “What you’re asking of me is something that is not within my power to do.”

“Why? Because it’s some kind of divine prophecy?”

“Yes.”

Castiel resisted the urge to yell by taking a moment to swallow his rage before asking in a dormant voice, “So, what? We’re just supposed to sit around and wait for it to happen?”

For the first time, Anna looked embarrassed, and she looked away. “I’m sorry.”

“Fuck you,” Castiel hissed, and she looked at him, surprised and wide-eyed. “Fuck you _and_ your mission. Your _God_.” Castiel got to his feet, his hands shaking. Anna rose silently in front of him, still looking startled, almost shrinking before him. Like his wrath was more terrifying than a celestial being’s. “If you don’t help me now, then when the time comes and you need me, like you say is _written_ , then don’t bother knocking. I won’t help you.”

Anna looked startled, like Castiel had pulled out a knife and had stabbed God straight in the chest right before her very eyes. Instead, he just held her gaze for a moment before he stormed away from her, walking right past her and back to the motel, wondering if Dean was back, wondering if there was some way they could fix this without roads and even Sam’s permission. He barely even slowed when he heard Anna call his name.

“Castiel,” she called, and then her voice rose when he didn’t respond, like she thought he wouldn’t be able to hear her in the deafening silence. “ _Castiel_!”

“What?” Castiel barked, turning around. “ _What_ , Anna?”

“You must understand why I can’t intercede,” she told him desperately, her hands held out helplessly, but he was sick of falling for the same smoke and mirror tricks of hers, and he wasn’t going to budge to them anymore. “Prophets are very special. They’re protected.”

“I get that,” Castiel told her, not too kindly but also still a little less angry.

As if invigorated by that same vocal hint, Anna took a small step forward eagerly. “If anything threatens a prophet, anything at all, an archangel will appear to destroy that threat,” she informed him, something alive in her eyes. “Archangels are fierce. They’re absolute—Heaven’s most terrifying weapon.”

Something shifted, and Castiel thought he understood. He stood straighter. “And these archangels,” he began slowly, looking into Anna’s eyes, “they’re tied to prophets?”

“Yes.”

“So if a prophet was in the same room as a demon?”

“Then the most fearsome wrath of Heaven would rain down on that demon,” Anna confirmed, a cat-that-ate-the-canary smile curling onto her lips. “Just so you understand . . . why I can’t help.”

She raised her eyebrows. Castiel, though, didn’t need the hint.

“Thanks, Anna,” he murmured softly.

“Good luck,” she told him, and disappeared at the same moment Castiel started to run.

*

Castiel burst into the motel room entirely inelegantly, and more than a little out of breath—the cigarettes seemed to already be doing a good job on ruining his respiratory system, but Castiel didn’t have the time to consider that further than skin-deep. Sam looked up from the foot of the bed, startled by his sudden entrance, and Dean jumped in the chair next to the door, his head snapping over to look at him. Castiel felt so pumped with adrenaline that he was almost surprised he wasn’t vibrating with the intensity.

He hadn’t felt so sure of one of his decisions in a long time.

“Where’s the fire, Cas?” Dean asked, looking him up and down like he was checking for injuries, and in the process he seemed to realize Castiel’s unexpected energy, and it caused him to frown worriedly. “Are you alright?”

“I’ve got a plan,” Castiel enlightened them, looking to Dean. “I need your help.”

Dean looked confused, but there wasn’t much he would ever refuse Castiel, so he said, “Alright.”

“I’ll tell you more in the car. Come on.”

At that, Dean hesitated. His eyes immediately flickered to Sam, always seeming to be hyper-aware of his presence in the room, but this time his gaze was like an anchor tethering him to his risk of a brother. Castiel probably should have considered this to be a slightly harder sell.

“Dean,” Cas said, making sure to look into the green eyes he loved so much. “Do you trust me?”

“Yeah,” Dean said.

“Then let’s go.”

Dean paused as if to weigh the options in the balance, and then nodded sharply, reaching over and snagging the keys off of the table. He glanced only once more at Sam before he stepped through the doorway, casting only one reluctant look in Castiel’s direction, knowing that he would understand, and he did. Castiel glanced back to Sam, who was looking confused but willing to continue sitting on the sidelines of the adventure.

“Just stay here,” Castiel told him. “Good luck.”

Sam’s eyebrows went up, but he nodded anyway. Castiel closed the door in between them and locked him and Dean outside of the room. Something about the closing of that door both relieved tension at the same time it built it back up, exchanging one worry for another. Dean and Castiel stood too close to each other, Castiel absorbed into Dean Winchester’s orbit the same way he would follow the man blindly off the edge of a cliff, and Dean seemed willing to lose the personal space bubble that he used to so reverently value. He raised his eyebrows at Castiel expectantly.

“Are you sure about this, Cas?” Dean asked like he couldn’t help but to make sure that his brother wasn’t going to be a demon snack, and Castiel was happy to assure him if it meant that Dean would just get into the goddamn car.

“I’m sure,” Castiel said, reaching out and putting the palm of his hand on Dean’s chest, right over his heart. “Just trust me.”

Dean took a deep breath before he kissed him once, and then they both loaded into the Impala and roared out of the parking lot, not bothering to waste a second. Dean barely even waited until they were on the main road before he couldn’t help but to ask.

“We going anywhere specific?”

“Just Chuck’s,” Castiel responded, and smiled when Dean sent him a questioning look.

Dean shook his head slightly when he hit the turn signal, getting into the left turning lane to head in the right direction, but he didn’t say anything about it being a bad idea or a waste of time. He only said, “I hope you know what you’re doing”, and followed along anyway without Castiel telling him that he was.

It was reassuring, at least, for Castiel to know that the blind faith was mutual.

*

They didn’t bother to knock—they just opened the front door and stampeded inside.

Castiel had managed to fill Dean in on what Anna had told him about the prophets and archangel on the short drive there, Dean having gone at least double the speed limit, which was the most terrifying when rounding corners, but they had made it there in plenty of time, both of them having a feeling of needing to hurry. Castiel, it seemed, had been the only one considering ringing the doorbell—but Dean had solved that worry when he had just reached for the doorknob and shouldered his way past unlocked doors and inside, and Castiel thought that it might be a good thing for another reason that Chuck had an archangelic guardian, since he was too inebriated to even lock his front doors.

Chuck was sprawled on the living room couch when Dean and Castiel thundered inside. He shocked awake like he had stuck a fork in an electrical socket, blinking rapidly.

“What are you doing here?” he demanded sleepily, sitting up quickly. “I didn’t write this.”

Dean just simply reached down and lugged Chuck onto his feet with one hand, sending the scrawny writer stumbling. “I need you to come help us.”

“What?” Chuck asked, still blinking away sleep. “Where?”

“The motel.”

“But that’s where Lilith is.”

“Yeah,” Dean said, unperturbed. “We need you to stop her.”

It took Chuck a moment to process that, and then the top of his head practically hit the ceiling.

“Are you insane?” he screeched, looking in panic between Castiel and Dean, like he wasn’t sure which one was the most out of their mind, which was probably a compliment to Cas but an insult to Dean.  “Lilith? I know what she’s capable of—I wrote her.”

“Listen to me,” Castiel ordered, grabbing Chuck’s shoulders and squeezing, and the shorter man flinched like he had just been shot, but his eyes were wide and attentive. “You have an archangel tethered to you. All you have to do is show up, and the archangel is gonna descend in a glow of holy fire and smoke Lilith. Got it?”

Chuck blinked like no, he certainly did not get it.

“But,” he tried to argue, “I’m just a writer.”

“This isn’t a story anymore, man!” Dean shouted, throwing his arms up. “This is real! And you’re in it! Now, I need you to get off your ass and fight!”

“No fucking way,” Chuck replied soundly.

Dean looked like he was going to shout some more, probably already having stored some choice words in regard to the prophet, but Castiel stepped in, hoping that his anger and adrenaline and his determination not to stand down showed on his face.

“How about this?” Castiel asked with false niceness, a rude smile on his face, carved into stone. “I’ve got a gun in my pocket, Chuck, and, if you don’t come with me, I’m gonna blow your fucking brains out.”

“I thought you said I was protected by an archangel,” Chuck pointed out.

“Well, interesting exercise,” Castiel bluffed easily, raising his eyebrows. “Let’s see who the quicker draw is, huh?”

Chuck agreed to their plan immediately.

*

Even Castiel would have admitted that, at this point, they were just kind of going with it. He had somewhat planned this far, but he hadn’t exactly known what to expect, either, or even that it would work. Castiel had threatened Chuck in finding out who the quicker draw was, but he hadn’t taken the time before the frantic drive back to the motel to consider if Lilith’s draw was quicker and more absolute than an archangel.

Maybe the archangel would be busy, and he wouldn’t even sense the danger until they were dust. Or stew.

Castiel wisely chose not to voice his concerns. And then, before he could really comprehend what might be waiting for them if they were wrong about this whole thing, to consider if Anna had set them up to fail, they were pulling into a spot, tires screeching, and it was too late to think. All he could do is act.

So he, Dean, and Chuck leaped out of the car, and Cas threw the motel door open, rushing in.

Sam was underneath of Lilith, who was now possessing a blonde adult woman, on the bed, and she was holding his knife at the ready, preparing to bring it down into his heart, but she was distracted by the sudden onslaught coming in through the door, and both of them looked over, surprised. She bounced back onto her feet at the foot of the bed, still holding the knife.

“Castiel?” she purred, and then smirked. “Good to see you, puppy chow. What brings—”

It was in that moment that Chuck chose to stumble into the room and awkwardly announce, very loudly, “I am the prophet Chuck!”

She blinked, and then said, exasperated, “You’ve got to be joking.”

“Oh,” Dean announced, coming up to stand next to Castiel, “this is no joke.”

As if perfectly cued, the motel windows were suddenly flooding with white light, like someone was pointing a search light at them, and a distant rumbling began that shook the ground under their feet, growing louder and more ominous with every passing second. Castiel blinked past the new glare, determinedly staring down Lilith, the woman who had made sure he was put into Hell, the demon who had made damn sure that he would burn.

He wanted to see her die. But, right now, he just wanted to see her lose.

“Chuck’s got an angel on his shoulder,” Castiel announced over the new screeching sound that was starting up lowly, the same sound that had come with Anna the first time, but his ears were beginning to hear the sound of a chorus of avenging, threatening voices, a million cheering hallelujah and faith at once, and he knew he didn’t have much time before they all became salt. “You’ve got about ten seconds before this room is full of wrath. You want to take your chances?”

Lilith stared at Castiel for a moment, outraged, before she threw a filthy glare back at Sam, and then she was gone, the memory of her the only thing left as the archangel approached, chants of war and promises of holy wrath heard clear only in Castiel’s ears, making his head spin.

The most perplexing thing of it all, was that he was sure he had heard it before.

And then that, too, was gone.

As if nothing had happened at all, everything was gone. There was no light, no sound, no demon bitch trying to seduce Sam into some freaky demonic passion. Sam lifted himself onto his feet, looking around as everything snapped back to normalcy, and it was just four grown men standing in a motel room, one of them confused, one of them pleased, one of them terrified, and one of them with a horrible, horrible headache.

“It worked,” Dean said, and then laughed. “Awesome.”

“I could have handled it,” Sam tried to argue stubbornly, frowning, but Dean sent his little brother a withering look that would have sent even an archangel scrambling for cover, and Sam wisely fell silent.

Castiel didn’t say anything, just looked at the windows, thinking about the wrath of angels.

They all stood in a numb silence for a moment, and then Chuck cleared his throat.

“Uh,” he said shakily, looking like he was going to be sick, “can I go home now?”

Dean’s eye twitched, but he still obliged.

*

“A deal?” Castiel asked lowly, his eyebrows furrowing as he frowned deeply, but he was still careful not to wake Dean in the bed by the window. Hell, he was sure even an apocalypse wouldn’t wake his boyfriend, but he still didn’t want to rouse him. Sam nodded conspiratorially, his eyes flashing in paranoia to check on Dean’s sleeping state in the same way.

Something should have felt amazing to be back in this position, with Sam as his best friend and confidant, whispering worries and secrets in the dark when Dean was asleep, but all it did was scratch at the inside of his stomach in worry.

Sam and Castiel had done this so many times. But it had never been so big of a truth in comparison to the omission-fueled lie that Sam had told Dean earlier.

Sometimes, the brothers didn’t know how to trust each other. So, when that happened, they always trusted Castiel.

It was Castiel that began to wonder if he even deserved their trust.

“To call the whole thing off,” Sam told him, making a motion with his hand like wiping a slate clean, and Castiel held his breath like the sharp motion would shatter his composure. “Angels, seals, Lucifer rising, all of it.”

“Huh,” Castiel said.

Sam noticed. He frowned. “What?”

“You didn’t think once about taking it?” Castiel asked honestly, not liking to keep secrets from Sam if he couldn’t help it—his big secret, his horrific mission from the angels, hung over his neck like a blade, and Castiel felt guilt for it with every passing moment.

Sam had the grace to seem surprised that Castiel would ask. “You kidding me?” he demanded a little too loudly but, after a mutual nervous glance to Dean to confirm he was still sleeping soundly, they turned back to each other. “You and him were all gung-ho about no demon deals, and you’re gonna ask me that?”

“I guess I am,” Castiel conceded gently.

“She would have found some way to weasel out of it,” Sam stated firmly, so sure of his own perspective that Castiel almost didn’t want to question what his life would have become if the deal had been made. “We would have been free, and it only would have cost us our lives. You know that you can’t make deals with that kind of crazy, Cas.”

“I know,” Castiel said, but didn’t offer much else.

“Anyway, that’s not the point,” Sam responded, leaning forward with a glint in his eyes and sadism in his expression that Cas didn’t like the looks of at all. “The point is, she’s scared. Lilith is freaked, and she’s running.”

“From what?”

“Hell if I know. Probably even _Hell_ , for all I know. But—she was definitely telling the truth about one thing.” Sam’s grin was horribly sadistic. It was like Castiel was looking at a shell of his best friend, and he couldn’t believe how different that one little intention completely changed him. “She’s not gonna survive this apocalypse, Cas. We’ll make sure of that. Right?”

“Right,” Castiel said, but he felt a little numb.

Sam yawned, and then stretched. “I’m gonna get some sleep. You should, too, you know.”

“Yeah.”

Sam paused, and then looked at Castiel, suddenly looking nervous. Like a child waiting to be chastised.

“You’re not gonna ask me about that thing Dean mentioned earlier?” Sam asked sheepishly, and Castiel was suddenly plunged into cold as he thought about what Dean had let slip, not seeming to realize Castiel had no idea—that Sam was dabbling in something dark, that he could so easily take the wrong step and discover it to be too dangerous. Castiel didn’t even understand the details, only knew what he had been told—that Sam had killed the demon that had spent thirty years torturing Castiel, and that he had done it with nothing more than a thought.

If that wasn’t dangerous, if that wasn’t deadly, then Castiel didn’t know what was.

But, still, he almost didn’t want to know. He didn’t want to have to force it out of Sam like this, to learn a secret that might be enough to force the angels into action if it was spoken out loud, as if they needed it to be confirmed. But, still, for one, terrified moment, Castiel was sure an angel would kill Sam if he said it out loud, so he told his best friend, “No. I’m not going to ask. But that doesn’t mean I’m not worried.”

Sam looked relieved before he tugged Castiel onto his feet and pulled him into a bear hug, slapping him twice on the back before pulling away, his expression so thankful that Castiel didn’t have the heart to tell him that he was still suspicious, that he was still worried, that he would still be watching.

Castiel figured it could wait until morning.

“Thanks, Cas,” Sam told him wholeheartedly, smiling sheepishly, before he turned and slipped into the bed, turning around until his back faced Castiel, and Castiel watched him, not knowing what else to do.

He wasn’t sure how long it took. Maybe ten minutes, maybe two hours, but Castiel didn’t allow himself to move again until Sam’s breathing had evened and he rolled restlessly, sprawled out on top of the bed the way he always did when he was deep in sleep. Castiel rose to his feet slowly, watching over the two brothers as they slept, wondering how much he would end up ruining their lives just because he couldn’t let them go.

Castiel turned and walked to the door, opening it slowly and softly, the chill of the early morning biting at his exposed skin, and Castiel turned to back out of the room.

He caught Dean’s eyes flicker back closed, and his chest rise and fall with another practiced, measured breath of feigned sleep. Castiel froze, his hand still on the doorknob and still standing half outside, his eyes on Dean’s face, shock settling into his skin.

Dean had been awake the entire time.

He had heard everything.

Castiel watched Dean take another breath, the same Castiel had been watching for the last several minutes, but this time he checked for Dean’s face, finally able to see it. It took another three breaths, but then his expression changed, too aware, and Castiel’s stomach dipped in horror.

He considered, for one brief and paralyzing moment, to step back into the room and accept his fate.

Castiel closed the door and locked it behind him, having a feeling he knew just how much trouble he was going to be in when morning came, but it didn’t stop him from turning around and walking in the direction of Chuck’s house, stuffing his hands in his pockets and ducking his head against nonexistent wind, shrinking into the night in hopes that it would swallow him up and claim him forever, but life was never that kind.

*

“Do you see what time it is?” Chuck asked shrilly for the third time since Castiel shouldered his way into the front parlor, Chuck barely offering any resistance anymore, simply just locking the door with a sharp click and a bottomless scowl. “It’s three in the morning, Castiel. I should have just pretended to be asleep.”

“You’ve seen this, but you’re going to pretend you didn’t, right?” Castiel demanded out of left field, turning to face the writer head-on. Chuck, always so emotional and real, winced, and Castiel didn’t need the humming computer on the dining table to tell him what he already knew.

“I was told not to write this one down,” Chuck told him slowly, flinching like he had been punched before striding to the nearest table and grabbing the closest bottle of anything alcoholic. “I met a friend of Sam and Dean’s today—they probably didn’t tell you about him, because it was when you were gone. His name is Zachariah. He works closely under Michael.”

“I take it that he wasn’t please about our stunt.”

Chuck made a sound like no, not really at all.

“How did Sam and Dean know him? They never mentioned they ran into another angel.”

“Ran into him? Dude, you’re really getting the cold shoulder, aren’t you?” Chuck demanded, blinking slowly. “No, you know what, I’m not getting in the middle of your domestic dispute. It’s already awkward enough having to write down the smut, man, I don’t need to do this.”

Castiel wanted to protest against the fact that this may finally be the series the fans get to see him full-frontal (which, Sam had informed him in glee and utter disturbance, was something strongly asked for by fans since his first entrance, ever since he fell in love instantly), but, in the end, Castiel was just too tired to argue with the alcoholic author anymore tonight.

“It doesn’t matter, Chuck,” Castiel announced, turning to face Chuck with his full body, squaring his shoulders. “You have to tell me what I need to do.”

“You don’t understand how this works, do you?” Chuck demanded, obviously agitated. His hands were shaking, and his eyes were shiftier than usual. Castiel was immediately suspicious. “I’m not even your friend! I’m not the guy you can ask for information about your own life. How—how about you just ask people, huh? Ask Dean and Sam things. Talk to them once in a while. Maybe then you’ll actually be able to stop it!”

Chuck flinched, and then went quiet. Castiel’s pulse was racing under his skin.

“F-forget I said that,” Chuck blubbered, his eyes widening as he stumbled back. His eyes found Cas’s, and they were apologetic. “I—I don’t know what you want from me.”

“Yeah, you do,” Castiel said lowly, dangerously, and started forward with fire in his eyes, hoping for intimidation and apparently receiving the correct response by the unease that crossed the other man’s face. “Don’t make me force you, Chuck. I’m not in the mood to play games.”

“Stop what you need to stop,” Chuck squeaked out, glancing nervously toward the windows, but his gaze quickly snapped back to Castiel’s. A tell. Someone was here—or, at least, would be here. Castiel immediately felt his hands curl into fists. “Just—Castiel, listen to me, okay, I don’t have much time to say this, but—the demons aren’t the only ones you should be hunting. Castiel, you have to listen to me, you have to believe me—”

Chuck suddenly cut off, swallowing hard, and Castiel knew his time was up. Instead of asking a thousand more questions the way he wished he could, Castiel just nodded, backing toward the door and not looking away from the author’s eyes, wondering why he was looking at Castiel like he would never see him alive ever again.

Castiel’s stomach flipped, and he wondered what he had seen.

“Sam’s not the only one you need to stop,” Chuck told him hoarsely, his hand curling into a fist against the table, his other hand shaking. He met Castiel’s eyes, and it conveyed more than enough.

“Thanks, Chuck,” Castiel mumbled, and then he walked back out the front door and into the night, immediately reaching for a cigarette, and wondering what the hell Chuck had been so afraid of, and terrified that he knew _exactly_ what it had been.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to be updating this story every ten days now, so that's exciting.
> 
> My tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> xo Slang


	20. Jump the Shark

Castiel tangled his hands in Dean’s hair, languidly breathing in the smell of motel shampoo and dirt and sweat and everything that makes Dean _Dean_. Dean nuzzled his face into Castiel’s neck, mumbling something into his skin that he couldn’t quite make out. Castiel’s chest heaved, breathing heavy. He had no idea how he could possibly ever focus on anything other than the way Dean’s hips move, or the way his hair looked when he’s run his fingers through it. Dean looked up at him, their bare chests hot against each other’s and their jeans way too inconvenient, and Dean smiled dazedly, like he wasn’t even sure if he was dreaming or not.

Castiel curled his fingers tighter and tugged Dean up softly until their mouths were pressed back together, forming a sloppy rhythm.

“Cas,” Dean murmured the moment he broke for air, his heart pounding underneath of Castiel’s hand. “We, uh, we still gotta talk. Whole reason we came out here.”

“Hmm,” Castiel responded, and then kissed him again.

Dean’s hands ran up and down his chest, like a blind man trying to see with the tips of his fingers, but, when his hands reached the top of his chest, Dean pushed him away ever so slightly. Castiel stopped and backed away, looking down at Dean curiosly, entirely in love with the sight of his bruised and swollen lips. Dean took a deep breath as Castiel reached out and touched those lips, the warmth in his chest expanding up into his smile.

“Cas,” Dean murmured, closing his eyes sleepily before forcing them back open, green on blue. “I’ve gotta ask about what that weird lady at Chuck’s publisher said.”

It took Castiel a moment. And then his joy was popped like a balloon. He let out a long breath and let his fingers drop from Dean’s face, feeling him retreating back inside of himself, using his own skin and bone as a shield that would never be able to withstand the power of what would soon be Dean’s disappointment.

Dean stared up at him earnestly, gearing up a little bit for himself as well. He seemed to know he probably wouldn’t like what he was about to hear.

Castiel remembered every moment of that night. He remembered every single moment from when Sam had died, to what he had. That one year would be something he would never forget, in his entire lifetime, about what it meant to be human, and for what sacrifice meant.

Castiel looked into Dean’s eyes, and he was almost too sad to tell him.

Castiel leaned the rest of his body weight into the leather of the backseat of the Impala, drawing Dean down with hesitant hands to lie on top of him, and Dean moved with him like pliable putty. Castiel took a breath, thinking, as he remembered the crossroad demon’s sugary laugh, and the way she had whispered into his ear after the deal had been made, _“Do not mistake this for bravery, Castiel Novak.”_

And Castiel never had.

“When Sam died,” Castiel began softly, his voice thin in the heavy weight of the air in the cab of the car, “I knew that I had to do something. I felt so helpless. Sam—he was the best friend I’ve ever had, and the world didn’t feel right. You yelled about just letting the world end, about having given enough—I felt the same, I guess, because I knew that, if we went back to fighting without Sam, it would be different. We would be reckless and dangerous and we would have gotten ourselves or each other killed just because we were so mad. I knew what would happen, and I felt like I had to stop it. Like, if I could do one thing, it had to be something that would stop you from hurting. So I stole the keys, and I went to a crossroads.

“At first, she didn’t want to deal. She laughed right in my face the second she showed up. But I guess she liked my offer enough to stay at the table. My soul for Sam and ten more years. She countered for Sam and five years. We went back and forth. And then she told me that, if I wanted ten years, I would have to offer your soul along with mine. That, if I really wanted Sam back, I would have to give you up too. The demons—I know now that they thought you were the righteous man, that they thought it was your father before you, so they just wanted to own your soul so badly. It must have been the easiest way to kill you, at least, to make a deal for your brother. But I couldn’t make that deal. I was doing this to save you, and I would never doom you. Never. I told her no. And then I—I made her an offer she couldn’t refuse.

“I told her that, if she brought Sam back, she could have my soul right then and there.”

Dean made a wounded sound. Castiel, for the sake of his own sanity, forced himself to ignore it.

“She got this look on her face then. Kind of like she wanted to laugh at me, but she also felt sorry for me. I guess she must have realized then that I am the righteous man, so eager to throw myself onto the coals to save both of you even though we weren’t even blood, and she told me she would bring back Sam and let me have one year. I thought at the time that she must have been being kind. Now I realize she was just being cruel. I was ready to die that night, but she stretched it into one year of looking over my shoulder, terrified for when the clock would stop, terrified of losing you or Sam again within that year in the messes we kept getting caught in. She must have just wanted to see me break down.

“Really, that’s all. She tried to trick me into handing over your soul, to thinking that it would take that, but I couldn’t do that to you. I knew that, at the time, you would have volunteered it, but now—now I’m glad I didn’t. I’m glad I protected you. I wouldn’t want to force Hell on anyone, most of all you.

“I made the deal for you, and for me, and for Sam. I did what I had to do. But I’m also happy that for whatever reason the angels need me on earth. I’m glad we didn’t have to leave it at that.”

Dean looked down at him. For one horrible moment, Castiel thought he could see straight through him—he thought he would ask Castiel why he had asked Sam those questions, or that he would ask where he had snuck off to the other night and why. Castiel was so sure he would know but, instead, Dean just smiled a little and ran his hand through Castiel’s hair, breathing in like he thought it would be the last good breath of air he would ever get again.

“Me, too,” he murmured, moving his lips back to Castiel’s, and conversation ended there.

*

It wasn’t until about a week after they left Chuck’s town in the rearview mirror that they found where they were heading next. Saying that it was unexpected was a bit of an understatement.

Dean had pulled over at a fill-up joint somewhere in between Midwest towns, a little place that reminded Castiel of the one he broke into not long after he pulled himself out of his own grave. Sam ducked off to go brush his teeth in the grimy bathroom accessible only to the outside on the side of the building, smelling of cat pee and mildew, and Castiel made a similar excuse and started after him, taking advantage of the first time he and Sam would be alone in a room together for the first time in several over the last couple of weeks.

Sam looked up when Castiel entered, and then smiled at him through his toothbrush. Castiel nodded in response and turned on the sink, running his hands through the freezing cold water, pumping the dirty soap dispenser and making a face when dust came off on his hand. He and Sam stood together for a mutual silence for a moment, the only sound water hitting the sink and the toothbrush scrubbing.

As Sam bent to spit into the sink, Castiel observed, “I think this is the first time we’ve been alone in a room for weeks.”

Sam laughed, wiping at his mouth. “For reasons no one can understand, you seem to favor my brother.”

Castiel laughed as he turned and leaned back onto the sink, watching Sam wash his hands. “Still, though. I would hate for you to feel like a neglected step-child—how about we take a break tonight and get a beer?”

Sam looked at him like he had grown another head, looking him up and down, before he replied, “I’m not giving you any insight into Dean’s heart or whatever it is you want to ask me about.”

“Fuck you, Sam,” Castiel replied, rolling his eyes. “So I suddenly can’t talk to my best friend just because I’m dating his brother?”

Sam suddenly looked scolded, like he thought Castiel was actually bothered by his teasing, and his shoulders slumped a little as he sacrificed a kind smile, one corner twitching up just slightly. “Sorry, man. What’s up?”

“Nothing,” Castiel answered, nonchalant. Sam’s eyes snapped to his, always able to tell.

“Uh huh,” Sam said skeptically, his eyebrows pulling together. “Sure thing, Cas.”

Castiel felt this going downhill, and fast. He knew he had to get out this bathroom if he didn’t want to have Sam asking him some questions he needed to prepare answers to, so he simply offered up a weak smile before turning and walking for the door, reaching for the handle. Before he could reach it, though, it flew open, and Dean was standing in the doorway, clutching a phone, looking like hell was on his heels.

Castiel froze, startled. He heard the sound of fabric moving as Sam straightened the way he always did when he knew something was really, really wrong, as if bracing himself for impact.

“Dean?” Sam asked, moving forward. “Dean, what’s wrong?”

“I just got a call on Dad’s old cell,” Dean told him, his eyes wild. “From his son.”

Silence. And then, Sam let in a shaky, startled breath.

“Windom, Minnesota,” Dean answered before either of them could ask, his eyes not stopping on either of them for long, skittering away before Castiel could catch his gaze. “Said his name is Adam Milligan. Let’s go.”

“Dean,” Sam tried to say, but it was too late, and Dean was already storming away to the Impala, the phone still clenched tightly in his hand. Castiel watched him go, not knowing what to say. And then, like perfect soldiers, Castiel and Sam listened to their order, and fell into step on the way back to the car.

*

“Dean, look, the best I can tell, Adam Milligan is real,” Sam tried to reason with his elder brother as they got out of the parked car outside of a diner called Cousin Oliver’s Hilltop Café. Even this place looked better than their typical dive, filled with hometown charm and locals all sitting down for coffee. Castiel looked around, glancing for signs of something being off, but he found nothing.

Dean, instead of heading for the door, headed instead for the trunk. Castiel could tell exactly what he was looking for by Sam’s frown, so he continued to give Dean the low-down of everything he had turned the radio up too loudly to hear in the car on the way over.

“He was born September twenty-ninth, nineteen-ninety, to Kate Milligan. No father listed on the birth certificate,” Castiel explained, glancing around the parking lot as if expecting the mysterious new Winchester brother to dissolve out of the trees. “Eagle Scout. Graduated from high school with honors and currently goes to the University of Wisconsin. Biology major, pre-med. Smart kid.”

“Are you even listening?” Sam demanded impatiently as Dean closed the weapons box and then the trunk, tucking weapons onto his person with a flat, unresponsive expression on his face. Castiel had rarely ever seen Dean so dormant, like a volcano with lava churning under the earth, getting ready to destroy cities. “Dean, there’s no reason for us to even consider—”

“It’s a trap,” Dean commented confidently for about the fifth time since the phone call, his denial stronger than his doubt, his eyes shining with terror and certainty. He gave his brother a long look before heading for the diner without another word. Castiel and Sam exchanged a look, a silent conversation stemming through the silence, before Sam turned and walked after his brother alone. Castiel paused at the car, leaning against it and pulling out a cigarette, lighting it as his eyes scanned the street, waiting for an ambush.

Castiel didn’t want to be there when Sam showed his brother what he found in their father’s journal. He didn’t want to watch the way Dean’s eyes would change when he found out that his father had been in Minnesota roughly nine months before Adam was born.

Castiel was only about halfway through his cigarette when a rusty SUV pulled into the parking lot, sliding into a spot by the door crooked. Castiel dropped the cigarette and ground it under his foot as he carefully watched a young man that had to be Adam Milligan emerge from the car, a backpack slung over his shoulder, locking his car up behind him with shaky hands. He nearly missed the lock. Castiel was already walking for the entrance before Adam turned for it, and he walked about a yard behind him up the stoop and through the door, the cold air conditioning hitting him in the face as he swerved to avoid Adam, who had paused just inside, glancing around for unfamiliar faces.

“Adam?” he heard Sam ask as he slipped a hand into Adam’s pocket and pulled out his wallet, Adam’s head turning in Sam’s direction, thoroughly distracted. Castiel slipped it into his own pocket, heading for a spot at the bar on the other side of the diner, keeping his eyes on all of the exits and entrances, hoping that Anna and the angels still cared enough to help him out a little if he got into a sticky situation.

A waitress crossed to him, smiling hospitably. He smiled back, pulling out Adam’s wallet and setting it on his lap.

“Can I get you anything?” she asked as the Winchester brothers and Adam began speaking, and Castiel was pretending not to notice, so he glanced down at one of the menus on the bar in front of him, pursing his lips.

“Can I just get a coffee for now?” he asked as the Winchesters’ waitress appeared with a warm greeting to Adam. “And maybe a couple slices of toast to go with that?”

“Sure thing, sweetheart,” she told him, moving off to get the coffee as Castiel looked down and began going through Adam’s wallet, taking a look at all of the cards in the holders. He glanced up and checked on the Winchesters’ progress—Adam was taking a sip out of a glass that must have been spiked with holy water, because Dean’s expression fell somewhat but his suspicion did not wander far. 

There was a part of the wallet that held pictures, and Castiel flipped that open, gazing at pictures of Adam smiling with a woman who looked to be his mother, pictures with a couple of his friends. Castiel’s eyes fell on the photo he hadn’t known he was looking for and he felt his stomach drop at the same time his waitress reappeared, setting down a small plate of toast and a coffee, smiling.

“Anything else?” she asked.

“I’m fine for now,” he told her, handing her a ten. “Keep the change.”

“Thanks, sugar,” she told him before ducking off to deal with another customer, a man who had been in there since Castiel had entered. He started chewing at a piece of toast, managing to eat one and a half whole pieces before he felt too sick, and he had to stop. He pushed the plate away, sipping at the coffee instead, hoping it would settle his sick-with-nerves stomach, listening as Adam told the brothers about his mother going missing, and then how he found out John Winchester was his father.

He told the brothers about how his mother had called John and told him, and how he had immediately come up to meet him. Adam said he was about twelve, and that he had seen John off and on since then. Castiel slid the picture out of Adam’s wallet and put the two in the pocket of his leather jacket, waiting for an opportunity to present his evidence.

Adam told Sam and Dean that he heard from John about once a year, as his food was arriving. He picked up the silverware—actual silver, ones that Castiel had seen in the Impala tucked inside of the weapons box—and nothing happened. Castiel breathed out, closing his eyes.

This was not going to be pretty.

“He taught me poker and pool and even bought me my first beer when I was fifteen,” Adam told the men sitting across from him, not knowing that he was speaking to his brothers, a nostalgic little smile on his face that reminded Castiel of all of the kids he had known in orphanages, the ones who had told stories about their past like they were recalling the best times of their lives. Most of the time, they were. Castiel felt for the kid, even if his heart started to freeze up when Adam continued, “And he, uh, showed me how to drive. Dad, he had this beautiful sixty-seven Impala—”

Dean snapped. Castiel could practically feel the reverberations, like it was a rubber band breaking on skin, when Dean said, “Oh, this is crap. You know what, you’re lying.”

Castiel immediately stood as Adam became indignant, not giving them much more time to argue before he crossed the diner and slid into the empty seat beside Adam, his eyes cold. Adam looked at him, confused, but Castiel didn’t look away from Dean.

“Dean, don’t,” Castiel urged him, feeling exhausted. “He’s not lying.”

“Come on, Cas, of course he is,” Dean began again, thundering his anger into words meant to hurt, to bruise, to break the toughest bones. Castiel shot him a glare and Dean simmered, smoke practically pouring out of his ears.

“Who the hell are you?” Adam demanded, looking between the brothers.

“My best friend,” Sam answered calmly at the same time Dean barked, “My boyfriend.”

Adam blinked, attempting to process it.

“Dean,” Castiel began, almost hating to do this as he pulled out Adam’s wallet, holding up the picture he found in there. “I found this in his wallet. He’s telling the truth, Dean.”

Castiel knew the moment Dean processed the picture. His face went slack and his expression fell, turning a sickly shade of green. Sam looked momentarily sad but recovered quicker, straightening up in that way he did to shield off the things he thought he could fight. Castiel almost felt sorry for his friend. Sam always tried so hard to save himself from everything bad, but it usually took more than confidence to kill the bad thoughts that ate at your mind.

“Hey!” Adam snapped indignantly, gaping at the picture and wallet in Castiel’s hand, feeling frantically at his pockets for the wallet he would not find. “How the hell did you get that?”

Castiel just sent him a look before setting the picture and wallet down on the table, sliding it to him. Adam snatched them up immediately, narrowing his eyes distrustfully at Castiel. He couldn’t care less.

Dean was still looking a little green around the gills, but he was scowling. The only normal color rising in his face was a bright shade of red, like his rage was bubbling to boiling under his skin.

“What the fuck is going on?” Adam demanded, looking around at all of them, on the defensive. “Who are you really?”

“We’re John Winchester’s sons,” Dean finally growled out, his eyes flashing. Adam’s eyes widened. “ _We_ are his sons. And we’ve never heard shit about you.”

“I have brothers?” Adam asked, looking like a stranger had just sucker punched him. Castiel suddenly felt for the kid. Where it certainly wasn’t easy for Sam and Dean, this whole kid’s world was being turned upside down. His mom was missing, and now he’s finding out that not only is his father dead, but he also has two older brothers walking around?

Castiel would have called it a blessing. By the fury on Dean’s face, _he_ obviously saw it as something closer to a curse.

“Look,” Dean snarled, “I don’t know if you’re a hunter or what, or what you’re playing at, but—”

“I’ve never been hunting in my life,” Adam replied, distractedly, as he looked in between Sam and Dean. “I have brothers?” he demanded again, sounding dazed.

“I don’t have time for this,” Dean declared, getting roughly to his feet. “Come on, Sam, let’s go. Cas.”

He turned around after two steps, when it was apparent he wasn’t being followed. His eyebrows were up, incredulous, as he looked to his little brother and his boyfriend. But Castiel wasn’t moving, and Sam seemed to be in the same boat. They exchanged a look, another silent communication, before Sam let out the breath he had been holding and turned back to Adam.

“Tell us what happened to your mom,” Sam told Adam slowly.

Castiel, if he hadn’t known better, would have called the expression on Dean’s face betrayal. But, he did know Dean, and he knew him well enough to know that wasn’t it at all.

It was fear.

But still, he stayed and, really, Castiel couldn’t help but to consider that progress.

*

Later, inside of the Milligan house, Dean and Sam got stuck on one picture.

It was the same one that had been inside of Adam’s wallet, but properly sized and fitted into a frame in the front room, right at the table opposite the door when they walked in. John Winchester was wearing a baseball cap, and he was grinning. Adam was a few years younger than he was now, and he looked just as happy. Behind them was a baseball field, specks of color indicating that play was in effect.

“He took you to a baseball game?” Dean demanded like he was speaking another language, his lips thinning.

“Yeah, when I turned fourteen,” Adam told them, hovering uncertainly a few feet away, like he wasn’t sure what their reaction would be. After the catastrophe at the diner, Castiel couldn’t blame him. “Dad was around for a few of my birthdays,” Adam added lamely, like he felt he had to say more.

Sam opened John’s journal, finding the right page and tapping at it, looking at Dean uneasily. “September twenty-ninth, two thousand and four. One word. ‘Minnesota’.”

Dean seemed to be barely listening. He turned to Adam, looking at him like he had just told him that babies were delivered from storks, after all. “He took you to a fucking _baseball game_?” he demanded again.

“Yeah,” Adam said, confused. “Why? What’d Dad do with you on your birthday?”

Dean looked away, putting the picture down. Sensing a potential explosion, Sam cleared his throat loudly, swinging to look at Adam.

“How long has your mom been missing?” Sam asked, shifting back into a professional persona. Adam seemed to catch on.

“Three days.”

“Who was the last person to see her?” Castiel jumped in, leaning against the wall. Adam glanced over at him.

“Mr. Abbinanti, our neighbor. He saw her come home on Tuesday night, but she never showed up to work on Wednesday.”

Castiel watched Dean touch the frame of another picture, one with John hugging Kate Milligan. She looked a lot like the pictures Dean had showed him of his own mother, Mary. Castiel flinched, practically feeling Dean’s own misery.

“Did you call the police?” Sam asked.

“Mom’s supervisor at the hospital did. And then I drove down here as fast as I could.”

Adam closed his eyes.

“I should have been there,” he commiserated.

Dean cleared his throat, tearing his gaze away from the photograph to ask, “What did the cops say?”

“They searched the house. Didn’t find anything,” Adam relayed back to him, clearing his throat and straightening up, a mannerism so much like Sam that Castiel felt like he had been hit square in the chest with a battering ram. If Dean’s sharp intake of breath was anything to go by, he must have seen the similarities, as well.

“She wouldn’t have left without telling anybody,” Adam told them confidently, stubbornly, like a little boy lost in a storm too big for him to handle. Castiel, in the back of his mind, remembered the screams of a Wendigo, and he knew that feeling. Adam laughed, a little uncertainly, a lot sadly, before he added, “It’s like she just dropped off the face of the earth, you know?”

Dean turned and looked Castiel in the eye. They were thinking the same thing.

“Adam,” Castiel said, looking back to the youngest son of John Winchester, not liking the feeling forming in his stomach. “Can we take a look at the house?”

*

Dean and Castiel began to rummage through the Milligan house as Sam stepped out to talk to the police in an attempt to find out everything that they know. Adam wandered behind Dean and Castiel like he wasn’t quite sure what else to do, and they glanced through all of the rooms before they made it into Kate’s bedroom, where Adam reported she must have been taken from. Castiel looked around for the obvious, and found nothing. Dean was staring uneasily at a picture of John, Kate, and Adam on the dresser. He noticed Castiel staring, and then moved to shift it forward, checking the wall behind it.

“The nightstand was knocked over,” Castiel began, turning to Adam. “Anything else?”

“Oh, not really,” he said, shrugging. “The sheriff said there was no sign of a break-in.”

Castiel hummed. Dean looked back at them, raising his eyebrows at Castiel meaningfully.

Adam caught the look. “What, you think the cops missed something?”

“Maybe. Yeah,” Dean said, shooting the kid a smirk. “They don’t have my eyes.”

“You’re a mechanic,” Adam deadpanned, looking confused.

“I’m not,” Castiel offered lamely, and then smiled weakly when Adam turned his attention back to him. “FBI,” he added, shrugging, hoping that the terrible scrambling lie didn’t show on his face. It must not have, because Adam nodded slowly, and turned to look back at Dean, chewing nervously on his lip.

It was until Castiel was checking the window that Adam managed to call, “Dean? What else could you tell me about Dad?”

Castiel glanced up. Dean had gone still, but he still turned around to look at Adam, looking like he was covered in paper-cuts and being soaked in lemon juice.

“You knew him,” Dean said lamely.

“Not as well as you,” Adam pointed out stubbornly, raising his eyebrows.

“Trust me, kid,” Dean replied, his voice going a little softer, his smile a little more plastic and further away, “you don’t wanna know.”

Before Adam could ask what Dean meant, or before Castiel could punch Dean for acting like a total asshole to his new brother, Sam appeared in the doorway, holding a stack of papers and looking like he had found something he hadn’t wanted to find.

“Excuse us,” Castiel said, interrupting the moment, and Dean and Castiel migrated with Sam down the hallway, to the top of stairs, just far enough to be out of hearing range. Sam still had that weird look on his face.

“You talk to the cops?” Dean asked.

“Yeah. Like Adam said, no leads on his mom.”

“Figures,” Dean snorted.

“But,” Sam began slowly, “I did find this.”

Sam handed them a piece of paper, a copy of something. Castiel took it, and Dean looked over his shoulder as they read silently, taking in the front page of the _Windom Gazette_ from January of nineteen-ninety, the headline big and bold and reading, “Missing Bodies Found”, the subtitle informing them, “Seventeen bodies recovered from abandoned shed”.

“In nineteen-ninety, there were seventeen grave robberies in Windom,” Sam informed them, tapping at the paper.

“Think that’s why Dad stopped by?”

“I’d say so,” Castiel said, and pointed to the picture. In the background of the photo, standing just behind the tape, was John Winchester himself, surveying the scene.

“Alright, so he was hunting something,” Dean said. “What?”

“No idea,” Sam replied. “Those were pages that he threw out of the journal. But, last month, the corpse snatching started back up again. Three bodies are missing from the local cemetery.”

“So, whatever he was after, he didn’t kill it. It’s back.”

“And, what, it stepped up its game to fresh meat?” Sam asked, frowning, rummaging for another paper. “I mean, Kate’s missing, and so is, uh—a local bartender. Joe Barton.”

He showed Dean and Castiel the photo. Dean snagged it out of his brother’s hand and turned to walk to Kate’s bedroom, where they had left Adam. Castiel sent Sam and exhausted expression before turning and following behind, Sam’s footfalls landing just behind his.

“Hey, does your mom know Joe Barton?” Dean demanded as Castiel and Sam paused in the doorway, looking in. Adam was sitting on the bed, looking up at Dean and squinting at the photo, frowning.

“I don’t think so,” he responded. “Why?”

Dean looked at Adam, and then paused, not responding. Castiel frowned, confused, and Sam shifted his weight, like he was about to push his way into the room in an attempt to shatter the silence.

Dean took a small step closer. His head was angled toward the floor. Looking at something.

“What is it?” Adam demanded.

“Watch out,” Dean replied as he flipped up the corner of the comforter, and Castiel spotted it—scratch marks on the floor. He looked at Sam. Sam looked back, his expression just as controlled as Dean let the comforter drop, turning back to Adam. “Give me a hand with the mattress.”

Adam and Dean managed to lift the mattress off the bed and out of the way, leaning it against the wall. In that time, Castiel and Sam managed to creep closer, close enough that they could clearly see the vent that was underneath of Kate’s bed—a vent large enough to fit someone through. Sam and Castiel looked at each other. And then Dean and Sam looked at each other.

At once, the brothers lifted their fists for rock-paper-scissors. As usual, Dean lost.

He sighed, looking toward the vent. “Every time,” Dean mumbled, and then reached down to tug off the duct.

“Adam?” Castiel murmured, and Adam looked at him, his eyes wide and panicked. He offered him a sad smile. “Flashlight?”

“Yeah,” he said, dazed, and then moved quickly from the room. He appeared just as Dean managed to get one side of the duct free, clutching a flashlight with white knuckles. Castiel took it carefully, appraising him.

“It might be best if you stayed here,” Castiel offered gently, his eyes letting Adam know it was an order. Adam nodded slowly, still looking entirely nauseous, and took an extra step back for good measure.

Dean ripped the rest of the duct off and took the flashlight Castiel was handing him without having to look, without thanks. He turned it on and shined it into the duct, Sam and Castiel hunching closer.

Blood covered the vent. Sam and Castiel looked at each other again, much more grimly.

“Why didn’t I pick paper?” Dean muttered sourly to himself before he slid inside, shining the flashlight around him. Castiel couldn’t explain why he felt particularly queasy once Dean slid inside of the vent, disappearing entirely for all but the sound of his movement, tinny vibrations echoing back to them. Castiel and Sam anxiously watched the opening of the vent.

It took another minute, but then Dean cursed. After another minute, he was wriggling himself out of the vent, frowning. He looked at Castiel, and then at Sam, before he slowly turned to look at Adam, his face giving nothing away.

“Adam?” Dean asked slowly. “Call the police.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> x Slang


	21. Close to Home

It took a couple of hours but, eventually, there was a knock to the motel room door. Dean looked up from where he was cleaning a shotgun, instinctually moving to cover it with a spare shirt. Castiel looked up from where he was reviewing a case file on the bed as Sam crossed the room, pulling open the door. Adam was standing on the other side, looking furious.

“Who the hell are you?” he demanded angrily as soon as the door was open.

“Adam, hey,” Sam greeted lamely, stepping back to let him in. Adam paused before storming through the door, his hands tightening into fists at his sides. Castiel straightened, tucking all of the photos and papers back into the manila file. Dean turned in his seat to face the middle of the room, where Adam was now standing helplessly, not knowing who to accuse first. When Adam didn’t say anything, Sam cautioned him nicely, “Take it easy.”

“No, don’t tell me to take it easy, okay?” Adam demanded, rounding on Sam. “My house is a crime scene, my mom is probably dead, and you three—well, you tell me to call the cops, but you got to bail before they show? So, who are you really?”

Castiel looked at Dean. Dean looked at Sam. Sam just looked helpless.

“The cops didn’t know where to look for my mom, Dean,” Adam began, so mad his voice shook, “but you did. And I heard you talking earlier—something about grave robberies.”

Castiel watched Adam’s eyes land on the table. Specifically, at the end of the shotgun sticking out from under the cloth. His jaw tightened.

“You’re not mechanics,” Adam growled, “and you’re not a fed. I just want to know what’s going on. Please.”

“We’re hunters,” Sam spilled the beans like no problem.

“Sammy!” Dean shouted reflexively, vaulting onto his feet.

“He deserves to know, Dean,” Sam told him calmly, not looking his brother in the eye. Instead, he looked at Adam, and Castiel had never seen that expression on Sam before. Something different than kindness. Something different than friendship.

He’d seen that look on Dean before, though. It was the way a big brother looked at his little brother.

Castiel bit the inside of his cheek.

“What do you mean, hunters?” Adam demanded, looking around at them frantically. Dean just shook his head, lowering himself back into his chair, obviously irritated.

Castiel saw his opening and stood slowly, clutching the case file like a shield. “This sounds like a family matter,” he said awkwardly, inching toward the door. “I’ll just leave you guys to handle this, alright?”

“Fine,” Dean growled as Sam insisted, “You’re family, too.”

The brothers went silent. Castiel raised his eyebrows. Adam let out a wobbly laugh.

“Trouble in paradise?” he tried to make a joke, offering a shaky grin. Castiel just looked at Dean, contemplatively, and then figured that he didn’t feel like having an argument, so he grabbed his trench coat off of the hook and stormed out of the room to the soundtrack of Dean’s heavy sigh, and Sam’s irritation.

And, although he didn’t make it farther than the curb, slamming the door behind him still made him feel a little better.

*

Castiel sat there for a long time, nursing two cigarettes and reading through the pages of the reports until his eyes started feeling like they were swimming with typed black letters, considering more than once to steal a car and then resisting. About an hour after his dramatic exit, right when his ass was going certifiably numb, he was almost pleased he hadn’t taken off because, after the sound of shouting from the motel room, Dean stormed out, slamming the door behind him. Castiel, an unlit cigarette in his mouth and his fingers on a lighter, raised an eyebrow at him.

“Feels better, huh?” Castiel asked, startling Dean enough to make him jump before whirling around to look at him. “Slamming the door, I mean. It’s pretty middle school, but at once cathartic.”

“You mad at me, too?” Dean demanded.

“Not anymore,” Castiel replied, tucking the lighter and the cigarette, untouched, back into the pack. He grabbed the file and stood up, stretching. “So, where are we going?”

Dean hesitated, like he wasn’t entirely sure if Castiel was telling the truth about his forgiveness or if he was about to punch him hard in the face, but eventually he conceded, “Was thinking about throwing on my monkey suit and heading to the cemetery to do the job while Sam makes it his personal mission to cram Brother Dearest with paranormal information. Want to come?”

“Sounds good to me,” Castiel said, leaning over to leave a quick kiss at Dean’s cheek before heading for the passenger side. Dean shook his head, but he was grinning by the time he got in the car.

“Got any better ideas about what we could do today?” Dean asked him, wagging his eyebrows.

“Drive, asshole,” Castiel told him but sacrificed a laugh, and then the world was a rumbling engine and a speeding car and a loud stereo and the bright glory of Dean Winchester’s smile.

*

The cemetery director barely glanced at their identifications before he allowed them onto the premises, and he didn’t even pause to ask why the FBI would be looking into such a strange local case, as most people normally do. That, at least, solved the mystery as to why this town seemed to be taking the cemetery being broken into with a grain of salt. Dean caught Castiel’s eye as they walked outside, and rolled his eyes.

The cemetery director took them to the tomb that had been broken into, a large white stone structure. The name over the top of the entrance read MILLSAP.

“This tomb was built in 1926,” the director informed them, patting the wall. “Four generations of the Millsap family were interred here.”

“They don’t build them like this anymore, huh, Cas?” Dean asked, mocking the man in his own special way, and Castiel laughed, looking around. The director eyed Castiel suspiciously.

“Tell me, Agent Simmons,” the director said, crossing his arms over his chest. “Have you thought about where you might like to spend eternity?”

Castiel paused, looking to the man. Dean froze.

“All the damn time,” Castiel muttered, going back to looking around. “So, three bodies went missing—any idea who did it?”

“Hooligans,” the direction responded with acid, and Castiel had to bite down on his tongue to keep himself from laughing. Dean turned away, obviously unable to hide his grin. “Sick, deranged hooligans.”

Castiel caught sight of something spilled on the side of the tomb. He moved forward a step, reaching out and touching it before bringing it to his nose. He sniffed it, once, and then immediately recoiled.

“This isn’t blood,” Castiel observed, eyeing it. “What is this?”

“No, it’s embalming fluid,” the director told him, sounding on the edge of a sigh, like Castiel should have known such simple information. Dean, from behind the director’s back, shot him an amused grin. The director continued, “Whoever committed this crime didn’t just take the corpses—they opened them up.”

Dean’s smile dropped. Castiel looked up.

“Say that again?” Castiel demanded.

*

The second they were out of hearing range of the director of the cemetery, Dean had announced loudly that he had needed a drink, and Castiel hadn’t even tried to disagree. Dean had turned the car in the direction of the nearest bar before Castiel had even bothered wondering how Dean was always so attuned to where the alcohol was, and they stumbled through the door less than five minutes later, Castiel already tugging at his tie.

They took seats somewhere in the middle of the bar, the rest of the place dead silent, Castiel’s reminder of how earlier in the day it was for them to be drinking. Dean immediately set down the case, flipping it open to a random page.

The bartender, a middle-aged woman with blonde hair, started over for them, two tap beers in her hand. She set them down in front of them.

“First beer’s on the house for cops,” she told them, looking between them. “Feds, too.”

“We that obvious?” Dean asked, graciously accepting the drink. Castiel held the glass in between his palms as he watched the woman. She grinned at them a little.

“I know all the local badges,” she told him, and then nodded to Castiel. “And this one’s got that _Law & Order_ vibe.”

Dean laughed, shooting a smirk to Castiel. The bartender pulled a rag from her belt loop and started drying a glass, keeping her eyes on the two of them as they sipped at their beers. Castiel almost wanted to order something stronger, but talked himself out of it.

“So,” the bartender began, “what’s the FBI doing in Windom?”

“Looking into the disappearance of Joe Barton,” Dean told her, grabbing a picture from the folder and sliding it toward her. The bartender looked down at it, seeming stricken, pale. Dean, always good at observation, asked, “I assume you knew him?”

“A little,” she replied, pushing the picture back. “I’m his wife. Lisa.”

“Well, Lisa,” Castiel began, leaning into the bar. “What can you tell me about his disappearance?”

“Same thing I told the sheriff,” she replied. “He stayed late Friday before last to do inventory. Never came home.”

“And the police?”

“Nothing. Truth is, I was scared they stopped looking. But now you’re here.”

Dean was looking at the photos behind the bar. Castiel looked up, and they both seemed to catch sight of the photo of Joe Barton in a police uniform at the same time.

“Joe was a cop?” Dean asked, eyebrows rising.

“Deputy,” Lisa the bartender corrected him. “For a little while. That was a loooong time ago.”

Dean cleared his throat before asking, “He didn’t happen to work the, huh, the grave robbery case, back in ‘ninety?”

“He did, yeah,” Lisa told them, and Dean and Castiel looked at each other. “Joe was the one who found those bodies. He got an award for that.”

“That was an interesting case,” Castiel offered. “He ever tell you how he did it?”

“Most of the time, he said good, solid police work,” Lisa told them, and then laughed fondly. “But, after a few beers, he’d admit he had a little help.”

“From who?” Dean asked.

“A specialist,” Lisa told them, rolling her eyes. “That’s all he’d say.”

“Cops ever find the guy that stole the bodies?”

“No.” Lisa paused, and then looked up at them, chewing on her lip. “But when I asked Joe about it, he’d say not to worry—that ‘we took care of what done it’.”

Later, when they exited the bar two beers down and a lot more information more, Dean sighed.

“You thinking what I’m thinking?” he asked.

“Either your dad didn’t kill whatever did it,” Castiel said, “or it had friends. Either way, we are totally fucked.”

“Joe Barton worked with my dad,” Dean listed off, holding up one finger. “Goes missing. And then Kate, my dad’s girl at the time of the hunt, goes missing. Seem a little bit too much like coincidence to you?”

“There’s no such thing as coincidence,” Castiel told him, reaching into his pocket for a cigarette, but the pack was gone. His gaze cut up to Dean, who was looking much too innocent. His eyes narrowed. “What are you, five? Hiding your parents’ smokes in some DARE campaign propaganda?”

“I hate when you smoke,” Dean told him honestly, narrowing his eyes. “You need to quit. It’s unhealthy, and the smell clings to my car. I am not having that smell in my car, man. It’s gross. And kissing you after a smoke is like kissing a dirty ash tray.”

“I’m at least finishing the pack first.”

“If you can find it,” Dean replied innocently before dipping down into the car, taking his place at the driver’s side. He smirked cheekily over at Castiel when he dropped into the passenger’s side, entirely not in nearly as good of a mood. The nicotine craving was clawing insistently at his brain like nails scraping against a chalkboard. He was going to go through Dean’s suitcase and clothes when he slept, and no one would be able to stop him.

“You’re a pain in the ass,” Castiel told him, not unkindly, and Dean laughed, coming to a stop at a red light and leaning over to capture Castiel’s face in his hands, pressing a kiss into his lips. Castiel would have thought the action adorable if he hadn’t been able to feel the smirk.

“I might be a pain in the ass,” Dean murmured, “but you love me anyway.”

Castiel pulled away far enough to look into Dean’s eyes, feeling his entire expression softening. He reached up and touched Dean’s face with the back of his fingers, trailing them down his cheek until his fingertips pressed against his lower lip, feeling Dean’s dazed smile under his touch.

“Yeah,” Castiel murmured, looking into Dean’s eyes and smiling just as dazed. “I do.”

“I do, too,” Dean whispered, looking down bashfully, “even if it sometimes doesn’t seem like it. You know that, right?”

Castiel just kissed him until the car behind them blared their horn, signaling that the light was green and that their stolen moment in time was over. But, still, Castiel leaned sideways into the window for the majority of the drive back to the motel, studying Dean’s profile and the way he was so bad at hiding his smiles, and Castiel only turned back to facing the front when they turned back into the motel parking lot.

The first hint that something was wrong was that the motel room door was wide open. The second was the sound that broke through the quiet and the metal of the car, the sound of Adam yelling, “ _Sam!_ ”

And then Castiel saw them—Adam was diving for Sam, who was gripping the bottom of Adam’s beat up SUV, something trying to drag him under. The car slammed to a stop, and Dean barely managed to throw on the emergency brake before he was diving out of the car as Adam screamed, “Dean, help!” Castiel fumbled for the door, about a foot behind Dean.

Dean and Adam each grabbed an arm, and Castiel slowed as they pulled him clear, coming up on the opposite side of the car. Dean grabbed a dropped shotgun and started shooting wildly and blindly underneath the body of the car, but there was nothing but silence. Sam heaved himself to his feet, breathing heavily, Adam looking just as spooked. Dean was back to wearing his game face, the shotgun in his hands, his finger still hovering over the trigger just in case.

“Everyone okay?” Dean asked, glancing around, and Sam and Adam nodded. Dean glanced over at Cas and breathed out heavily, shooting him a grin. “That was some great timing, huh, Cas?”

Castiel opened his mouth to respond just as something suddenly gripped his ankles, and tugged.

He let out a shout as he was suddenly being dragged on the ground, under the car, trying to catch the bottom but failing, and all he heard was Dean scream “ _Cas!_ ” before he dropped, and his head hit something, and the rest of the world drained from color and sound to a peaceful none.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> x Slang


	22. Family

When Castiel opened his eyes, his head hurt, his stomach was empty, he was bleeding, and he began to understand why Dean had said it was like kissing a dirty ashtray.

Castiel groaned, rolling over on the cold stone, forcing his eyes open. It was daylight enough that he could still see around without having to strain, but the light was from a stained glass picture window twice his height up, casting prisms of light onto the walls. It was a pretty sight until Castiel started coughing up at all of the dust, and he realized he was in a tomb filled with coffins. Castiel venomously and sarcastically couldn’t help but to think that this would be the perfect way to wake up every day.

He wasn’t even sure what had trapped him here.

All he remembered was getting grabbed at the ankles, hitting the ground, Dean yelling his name, and losing consciousness, probably after hitting his head on the sewer grate that must have been right under Adam’s car. Castiel groaned as he pushed himself into a sitting position, blinking past the light that made his headache ultrasensitive to get a good look around the crypt.

One of the coffins was open.

“Shit,” Castiel mumbled, heaving himself up onto his feet and walking over, taking a peak inside and immediately feeling a little bit more nauseous than he felt a few seconds ago. The body—what was left of it, anyway—was mangled. Castiel could make out an arm, a pair of glasses, and what looked like parts of the guy’s intestines, all soaked in blood. Castiel raised an arm to cover his nose and mouth against the smell, his eyes watering.

Castiel remembered the picture of Joe Barton, and looked back at the glasses.

“Sloppy Joe,” Castiel muttered to himself, slowly closing the lid.

His chest ached at the reaching movement and Castiel winced, reaching up and touching where he could feel the skin split, all the way down his chest to the top of his stomach. He glanced down at it, remembering the drag of the hellhounds’ claws, and he flinched, dropping his hand.

Later. He could have whatever kind of panic attack he felt like he was about to have later. Now, he had to focus, or else he would never get out of here alive. He glanced around, looking for a doorway or a tunnel or anything, but there was nothing. Rather, there had been something—there was a tunnel down at the ground level where he had woken up, but it had been collapsed, destroyed, obviously in an attempt to keep him there. Castiel sighed as he glanced around at the other two coffins, a sick sort of curiosity burning in his stomach.

He took three steps until he reached the first one, closed but covered in blood. He took a deep breath, steeled himself, and threw the lid open.

The body of Kate Milligan, or at least most of it, stared up at him.

Joe Barton. Kate Milligan. Both of them being here, and even obviously being some serious supernatural chow, made sense. Castiel gazed nervously at the third coffin, wondering if there was a missing person that they hadn’t known to investigate, or if the things that kidnapped him were sick-minded and set him up with his own coffin to curl up and die in.

Castiel paused, his hand curling around the lid. And then he lifted it.

“Son of a bitch,” he whispered, stunned, as he stared down at the body of Adam Milligan. He stumbled back, panic surging with adrenaline through his bloodstream, sending his thoughts into motion. Castiel stumbled back, spinning around to look, realizing that Dean and Sam were with a monster, a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and he couldn’t let it hurt them. He couldn’t let something wearing their brother be the end of them when he was buried aboveground in some kind of crypt, fully aware of the truth.

Castiel ran on fifty percent adrenaline and fifty percent desperation as he started kicking at the tunnel, trying to see if the concrete and stone would budge. It wouldn’t, no matter how frantically he kicked, no matter how much force he put into it. Castiel let out a frustrated scream when he kicked and nothing moved, not even a little bit, and he pushed himself back up, rubbing his hands over his face.

“Come on, Anna,” Castiel whispered, looking around desperately. “Don’t let me die in here. Help me out.”

There was no response. It wasn’t exactly as though he expected one, but a sign or something would have been nice.

And then, Castiel looked up into the stained glass window depicting an angel, and he murmured, “That is so not funny.”

It was difficult and nearly threw out his back and he probably got some kind of disease from all of the blood that more than likely made it into his open wound, but Castiel managed to drag all of the coffins on top of each other, yanking a lead pipe off of the wall at eye-level. Castiel dragged himself up into a balanced position on top of the several coffins and, once he was sure he wasn’t about to fall backwards to his death, he brought his arm holding the pipe back and smashed it into the glass, popping out all of the pieces along the rim until he could pull himself out, the injuries not even being enough to slow him down. He gasped in clean air like a dying man and flopped down onto the ground, groaning as he rolled back onto his feet, looking around.

He had no idea how long he had been unconscious, but he knew one thing for certain—he would have to find the Winchesters, and not-Adam. And the motel, to them, would seem compromised.

Castiel barely had any qualms about stealing the cemetery director’s car after that question about where he was going to spend eternity. As if Castiel had to be reminded, for not the first time, that, when he died, he would be going back downstairs, anyway.

Castiel slammed on the gas, and pointed the car in the direction of the Milligan house.

*

The front door, thankfully, was unlocked when Castiel got there, saving him the trouble and noise of having to pick it, but also leaving him nice and open to an ambush. Castiel pushed the door open slowly, glancing around before sliding all the way into the house, letting the door shut quietly behind him. He had no idea how, but he moved entirely noiselessly to the other side of the front room, where the doorway to the kitchen was, where he could hear muffled voices. Castiel raised the steal pipe as he paused against the wall just out of sight, gripping his only weapon tightly.

He heard the sound of Sam crying out. Dean growled out an insult.

Castiel didn’t like the sound of that.

A woman laughed, obviously one of the monsters. Castiel figured it must have the form of Kate Milligan.

“Thanks to your daddy,” not-Kate purred, “my brother and I grew up on our own. At least we had each other.”

“Like you and your brother,” not-Adam agreed. “Inseparable. Like you said, Sam—the only thing you can count on is family.”

Dean made a pained sound. Castiel ducked his head slightly around the bend, just to get a look, and found the Winchesters tied up—Sam to the kitchen table and Dean to the fridge. They both had blood dripping down their arms; not-Kate was standing over Dean, cutting into his flesh with razor-sharp fingernails. Not-Adam, his hands already covered in blood, was appraising Sam curiously, a smirk curling onto his lips, a dagger in his grip.

Castiel spied Dean’s shotgun by the kitchen door, probably having been knocked away in a struggle. Castiel would be able to reach it in plenty of time before not-Kate and not-Adam noticed him if he played his cards well enough. Castiel ducked back around the bend, trying to frantically come up with a plan, as the monsters continued their dramatic speeches.

 _Ghouls_ , his brain identified for him, and he wondered how he was so certain he was correct.

“For twenty years,” not-Kate continued, “we lived like rats.”

“Graveyard after graveyard,” not-Adam sighed. “All that stinking flesh.”

“Then we thought, ‘hey, why not move up to fresher game?’”

“And we knew just where to start.”

Sam hissed. Castiel assumed it had something to do with Adam’s knife. Castiel’s hands curled into tighter fists, swallowing hard to keep himself from not timing his attack correctly.

“Revenge,” not-Adam began wistfully, humming. “You’re right, Sam—it’s never over.”

“First, it was John’s cop friend, and then his slut, and then his son.”

“And then I called John, but the son of a bitch was already dead.”

“So I guess you and Dean will have to do.”

“Don’t forget _Dean_ ’s slut for dessert,” not-Adam reminded her, and then laughed. “Might as well wipe out every connection, right, sister?”

“Right,” not-Kate confirmed, sounding on the brink of laughter. He heard struggling. He assumed it was Dean. He figured his assumptions were practically confirmed when Dean growled, “You son of a bitch, where is he?”

“Safe and sound,” not-Adam assured him patronizingly.

“Don’t worry, Dean,” not-Kate cooed. “He’ll be dead soon. Probably even sooner than you.”

“We’re gonna feed on you two nice and slow—like we did with Adam.”

“Oh, and, by the way, he really was your brother. You should know that.”

Sounds of struggling. Sounds of someone going nowhere.

“He was alive when we took our first bites,” not-Adam rubbed salt into the wounds.

“And he was a screamer,” not-Kate added silkily.

Dean made a strangled pained noise, and Castiel had to take a silent deep breath, deciding now was better than never. He inched into the room, practically blending into the background, the ghouls and the Winchesters in their own little bubble. He softly set the pipe down on the floor and picked up the shotgun in its place, rising slowly. Not-Kate was holding a bowl at one of Dean’s bleeding wounds, and not-Adam was twisting his knife around his fingers like a magic trick.

“Sam, the more that you struggle, the faster you’re gonna bleed out,” not-Adam scolded him like a concerned brother, watching not-Kate set the bowl down under Sam’s wrists to catch the blood and back up a few steps, as if marveling their creation. “So you might as well lie back and relax.”

“Hey!” Castiel yelled, and then fired.

Not-Kate’s blood splattered the wall above the Winchesters, and then her headless corpse hit the ground. Dean yelled his name in surprise and not-Adam spun to face Castiel, looking infuriated. The ghoul got a good handle on the knife, staring Castiel down with hate twisting over his face.

“Castiel,” not-Adam greeted, raising his eyebrows. “You should be dead and trapped already. You’ve lost a lot of blood.”

“Yeah, well,” Castiel replied, “I’ve got an angel on my shoulder.”

And then he fired.

It hit not-Adam in the shoulder, sending him stumbling back and growling, holding the wound. Castiel spied Dean frantically working at his restraints, but he wasn’t sure how close Dean was to worming his way out of them. Sam was sitting limply, his wrists badly cut and much more bloody than Dean, his eyes pained and a little unfocused. Castiel felt a shock of panic hit his heart before he turned back to what he needed to take care of first, raising his gun for the last headshot.

Castiel paused. And then pressed the trigger again. _Click._

“Motherfucker,” Castiel cursed loudly at the same moment not-Adam leapt at him, his hands reaching for Castiel’s throat. Castiel barely managed to avoid not-Adam’s grip, but he still went down in the tackle, sprawling onto the floor and groaning in pain. Not-Adam, still holding the knife, brought it down to his chest, using Castiel’s momentary lapse of control at being winded to his advantage.

“Want to recreate some special memories, Castiel?” not-Adam growled, digging the point of the knife into his chest, right next to the first wound. Castiel cried out, though he tried to muffle it, sinking his teeth into his bottom lip so hard that he felt the skin split. “Let’s see how tough you are when I shred your chest the same way the hellhounds did. Let’s see who wins the new fight for your soul, righteous man.”

He raised his arm, preparing to bring the blade down home. And then a metal pipe slammed into his head and not-Adam was sent rolling off of Castiel, groaning in pain. Castiel scrambled away, trying to make it onto his feet and failing, as Dean pinned not-Adam down by sitting on his chest, and he swung the pipe again and again and again and again.

Dean didn’t stop until there wasn’t much left. And then, even then, it still looked like he wouldn’t stop.

Dean might have kept going if Castiel hadn’t weakly coughed out, “Sam.”

Dean stumbled off of the ghoul’s body, turning around wildly before he dove for a set of drawers, tugging out a bunch of dishtowels by the handful, somehow knowing just where to find them, and flying back to his brother, landing on his knees before him. Sam groaned his name as Dean pressed the towels against the open wounds, using not-Adam’s dropped knife to cut the binding. Sam reached with his free hands to press the towels against his wrists, grimacing and groaning. Dean gently moved Sam until he was sitting up and leaning against the cabinets, murmuring to him the entire time, a string of _come on, hang on, there you go, here we go, hang on buddy_.

“Thank you,” Sam groaned, leaning against the cabinets heavily, Dean’s hands joining Sam’s on the wounds of his arms. Dean looked up at grinned at his little brother, his eyes soft.

Dean loved Castiel with his whole heart. But he lived for Sam. Sometimes, Castiel let him forget that, and closed his mouth against asking Dean to help him up, instead sinking into the kitchen floor and letting the blood loss and dizziness sweep over him as he dazedly watched Dean slap his little brother on the ear fondly.

“That’s what family’s for, right?” Dean replied, and then added, “Keep pressure on that.”

And then, for the second time in the last several hours, in the dread and acceptance that Sam would always be first and that he should never have expected to be considered their family, Castiel lost consciousness.

*

“Are you sure we should do this?” Sam asked for at least the twelfth time that night.

Adam’s body, the real Adam, was wrapped in a sheet. Dean and Sam and Castiel had gotten his body from the crypt and had brought it out to the woods surrounding the town. They built a pyre from wood, and then they laid the body on it. Now, it was up to lighting the flame.

Dean opened a bottle of lighter fluid, looking down at the body. Castiel was hanging back, not butting into the family moment but having nowhere else to go, a silent observer over the scene. Dean continued to look at the body as he nodded.

“Ghouls didn’t fake those pictures,” Dean pointed out softly, gruffly. “They didn’t fake Dad’s journal.”

Dean stepped forward to sprinkle lighter fluid over Adam’s body. Sam watched him, anxious.

“Adam was our brother,” Dean declared. “He died like a hunter. He deserves to go out like one.”

“Maybe we can bring him back,” Sam offered softly, staring at the body and swallowing hard. “Maybe we could get ahold of Anna, call in a favor.”

“No,” Dean murmured. “Adam’s in a better place.”

Dean lit a match, pausing only for a moment before he tossed it onto the pyre. Adam’s body went up in flames, the fire growing until it reached up so high it could practically touch the sky. Sam let it a large breath, and then seemed to struggle to let it go.

Dean was the first to speak when he said, “You know, I finally get why you and Dad butted heads so much. You two were practically the same person.”

Sam looked over at him, surprised. Dean didn’t look away from the fire.

“I mean, I worshipped the guy, you know?” Dean continued, his voice shaking. “I dressed like him, I acted like him, I listened to the same music. But you were more like him than I will ever be. And I see that now.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Sam replied, subdued.

“You take it any way you want,” Dean said, and then the brothers were silent as they watched the body of the brother they had never known burn.

Castiel turned and walked away, not stopping until he hit the road, miles and miles away. He didn’t even know if the brothers had realized he was there in the first place, or if they noticed he was gone. He suddenly felt so invisible, so much like empty space and still air, that it felt like his chest was going to explode, because how could he think that the people he considered his family would ever think the same as him?

Castiel muffled his scream into his jacket, tears burning at his eyes.

Castiel knew that the Winchesters were the closest thing he had to family, and he was prepared to die if it meant he would be able to protect them. He had done it before, and he was prepared to do it again.

He didn’t have to be an honorary Winchester to fight beside them.

Castiel was willing to accept what he could at this point, and move on.

He looked around the woods of Windom, Minnesota, and damn was he ready to move on.

But he still couldn’t shake the inexplicably bad feeling in his stomach about Adam Milligan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unedited. Yikes. Sorry about that.
> 
> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> x Slang


	23. The Rapture

By the time Castiel finally has the opportunity to corner Sam, it was a week after they burned Adam, and Castiel had figured out so much. He was still low, knocked down a few pegs from something that he never thought would bother him and _should not_ bother him at all, and, once he had finally mustered up the courage to dig deeper into what was up with Sam rather than random phrases heard from Dean or suspicious disappearances, Castiel was practically shaking with the effort to keep himself from starting the intervention in front of Dean.

But Dean had stepped out to check out a lead. Castiel finally had the time and the means. He couldn’t wait to approach the topic anymore, not wanting Sam to get hurt, not wanting this to continue.

“Sam,” Castiel called to get his attention, and that was how it all began.

Sam looked up from the keyboard of his laptop, his forehead wrinkled in concentration from whatever he had been reading. His eyebrows immediately soared when he spotted the way Castiel was nervously hovering in front of the door, like he was afraid Sam would bolt, because he _was_ afraid Sam would bolt, and he slowly reached up and closed the laptop, smiling kindly.

“Time to talk?” he asked, dimples flashing as he leaned back in his chair. The light caught the panes of his face, and the circles under his eyes looked even darker. Castiel’s fingers twitched, like he would give anything to be able to reach into Sam’s chest and pull the bad right out of him.

“This has to stop, Sam,” Castiel whispered, feeling like there were razor blades in his throat. He swallowed heavily, reaching up and running a hand down his face. Sam’s face dropped as he watched him, growing uneasy. He definitely must not have been expecting this. Castiel almost wanted to feel bad for him, but he wasn’t about to move aside, and he was getting sick and tired of feeling like he had to stand down.

Sam blinked up at him, his eyes wide, and asked, “What are you talking about, Cas?”

“You know what I’m talking about,” Castiel growled, throwing his hands up. “I’ve let you get away with it for weeks, but—this shit that you can do to demons? Sam, come on, you have to know that’s not normal.”

Sam immediately straightened, going on the defensive. His face fell from confused to closed. Castiel watched his best friend throw up his walls, and he wondered when he always knew it would have to come down to this.

Sam got to his feet. The chair scraped loudly against the linoleum, like a scream.

“I don’t need to hear this from you, too,” Sam replied harshly, eyes flashing. “Dean’s already given me enough shit. Listen, Cas, it’s _fine_. It’s _helping._ ”

Castiel stared at him. He felt like he didn’t even know Sam at all. “Do you even know how far off the reservation you’ve gone?” Castiel demanded, his voice rising without him really meaning to start shouting, but he was shaking now, so angry and feeling unreasonably betrayed by Sam Winchester. He wanted to punch something. He held off, because the only thing he could think about punching right now was Sam, and he didn’t want it to escalate like that. “Do you even _hear_ yourself right now? You and Dean have told me nothing about the months I was gone, and I get that, I really do, because I haven’t said much either. But this—Sam, how long is it going to take for you to realize this isn’t good? That this isn’t helping?”

“I’m just exorcising demons!” Sam cried.

“With your _mind_!” Castiel screamed, and then had to pause to reel himself back in, clamping his jaw shut and counting to ten before he spoke again, this time his voice lower and much more calm. “What else can you do?”

“I can send them back to Hell,” Sam informed him, a little more eager now that Castiel’s anger seemed in control, but he had no idea that Castiel was really on the edge of an explosion. “It only works with demons, and that’s it, I swear.”

“What happened with Alastair then?”

“I, uh,” Sam stuttered, caught off guard, and Castiel’s fists tightened again. “I just—kinda lost it, I guess. We came in and he was killing you and Anna, man, and I freaked so I did the trick but—I don’t know. I just killed him. Wiped him off the map. I have no idea what happened.”

“What else can you do?” Castiel growled.

“I told you!”

“And I have every reason in the world to believe that, right?” Castiel demanded. “Look at you, Sam! You’re fucking falling apart! You look like a goddamn drug addict, you know that? You might be able to hide how drained you are to Dean, but I see you, and this behavior? It’s not _normal_. So I’m going to ask you one more time, and you need to tell me the truth. What else is going on?”

Sam stared him down. And then he looked away.

Castiel lashed out. The lamp crashed into the wall, shattered shards scattering on the floor. Sam turned back to look at him, surprised. Castiel was usually calm, controlled, calculative. But now it felt like he couldn’t even censor his own speech. Castiel was falling apart again, for not the first time since getting back from Alastair’s torture, and Castiel wished that, when the angels brought him back, they would have been able to bring him back the way he was before.

Everything would have been easier if they could have just changed his soul.

“I’m pulling demons out of innocent people,” Sam pleaded with him, holding his arms out in an open body language, his eyes wide and innocent and desperate, but Castiel just felt angrier and angrier. “The knife, it kills the victim, but what I’m doing, most of the people survive if they aren’t hurt before! I’ve saved more people in the last few months than all of us have saved in a year!”

“Does Ruby want you to think that?” Castiel demanded, and Sam’s hands dropped back to his side as he flinched. “Didn’t think I wouldn’t guess, huh? You sneak out in the middle of the night constantly, Sam, where the hell else would you be going? You’re going to see Ruby, and she’s brainwashed you into thinking you’re doing the right thing, but you’re _not_.”

Sam shook his head, but Castiel didn’t give him enough time to speak.

“That’s a slippery slope, Sam. Just wait and see. Because it’s gonna get darker and darker, even more than it is now, and God knows where it ends.”

“I’m not gonna let it go that far.”

“It’s already gone too far, Sam!” Castiel yelled, throwing up his arms. “This isn’t getting a sneak peak into the future, this is pulling an evil entity out of people with your goddamn _will_. This is—if I didn’t know you, Sam? I would hunt you. And so would any other hunter.”

Sam flinched. Castiel saw there were tears in his eyes, his shoulders slumping, but he didn’t care. Castiel was beyond betrayed, beyond angry, and he wasn’t about to let Sam get into this any further than he had already become.

“You died,” Sam whispered, swallowing heavy, “and it was like Dean died with you sometimes, and I had to keep fighting. What I’m doing, it works, Cas. You have to believe me.”

“Then why did an angel,” Castiel grated, “tell me to stop you?”

Sam looked up, taken aback. Castiel met his gaze, feeling like he was burning with heaven’s wrath.

“What?” Sam asked, horrified.

“Anna sent me back to you and Dean,” Castiel told him through his teeth. “She told me that, if I couldn’t stop you, _she_ will. Do you see what that means, Sam?” Castiel took a step closer. Sam, still looking flabbergasted, didn’t even blink, just stared at him with horrified wide eyes. “That means that Heaven, that _God_ , doesn’t want you doing what you’re doing. And you’re going to stand there and tell me that it’s all good?”

At first, Sam didn’t reply. He just stood there and stared, his horror dissipating, realization dawning. And then the walls came up, and the eyes he fixed on Castiel were filled with hellfire.

“So that’s why you came back?” he demanded darkly, angrily. “To act as the angel’s gift-wrapped assassin?”

Castiel reacted by throwing a right-hook into Sam’s face.

Sam stumbled, catching himself with two steps, his hand coming up to touch his jaw. Castiel’s hand throbbed, and he felt where the hit had broken the skin on his knuckles. Sam slowly raised his head, dropping his hand slightly so Castiel could see the bruise already beginning to form at his jaw, right by the corner of his mouth. Sam’s expression was cold, unfathomable. There was none of his normal kindness, or his sympathy. This was what Sam looked like when he looked at a monster.

“If you think I’m dangerous,” Sam murmured coldly, “then I can’t imagine what you see when you look in the mirror.”

Castiel looked at Sam, feeling like he was burning in acid.

And then the motel door flew open.

Sam and Castiel both turned, jumping, as Dean stormed in, his expression dark, practically being followed around by a thundercloud, and when he looked at the two of them, his eyes flashed like unforgiving lightning, and Castiel knew immediately that Dean had heard everything they had said.

Sam seemed to know, too. He was shrinking before Castiel’s very eyes, a little kid again in the focus of his big brother’s anger.

Dean looked in between them, his eyes unfathomable. Castiel was entirely certain that Dean was going to charge forward and punch him.

But he didn’t. He just said, his tone darker than his mood, “I found the demon hideout. We should hit it soon, before they skip town.”

He looked at them again. And then he turned around and walked out of the room, leaving the door wide open in his wake.

Castiel’s first instinct was to glance at Sam, to see what his expression was, but he didn’t, too afraid to look at him. He faced firmly ahead and took two steps forward, pausing only to collect his jacket from the table before following Dean out the door. Once Castiel crossed the threshold, Sam started moving.

Needless to say, the car ride wasn’t pleasant.

*

His phone didn’t start ringing until they were idling by the car, outside of the warehouse Dean had spotted the demons’ presence and was analyzing the situation for a danger level. Castiel reached for the phone automatically, rushing to quiet it, ignoring the dark frowns both Dean and Sam sent over their shoulders in its wake. Castiel ignored the call, glancing at the number. He didn’t recognize it.

Less than thirty seconds later, it started ringing again.

“Jesus,” Castiel muttered impatiently, tense and angry still, pressing the button to answer before holding the phone up to his ear. “Hello?”

“Castiel,” a velvety woman’s voice responded in a coo. Castiel was barely even disturbed that this faceless person behind the unknown number knew his name. At this point, it felt rather par for the course. “Where did you go, sweetie? It looks like we’ve lost you.”

“I am so not in the mood for this,” Castiel replied in irritation.

“That’s good, so this’ll go quick,” the woman responded, chipper and cunning. “I like to think you’re smart enough to know where we are. We want you to come on in and talk.”

“Who is we?”

The length of the conversation was enough to draw the interest of the Winchester brothers. They both glanced over, their eyes falling on him, but Castiel didn’t bother to look at either of them. He was too afraid of looking at Dean and flinching away, afraid of his anger for what he knew now; and he didn’t want to look at Sam, too afraid of the drowning man that he would not be able to pull above the currents. Perhaps that, alone, was telling enough.

“We want to talk to you,” the woman cooed, successfully managing to answer the question without giving him an answer at all. “How about you meet up with us, and we have a little chat?”

“Why would I want to talk to demons?”

“I don’t know,” she pretended to ponder, like it was even a good question, before she breathily murmured, “Maybe we have a couple of secrets to tell you about those angel friends of yours.”

“Mhm,” Castiel replied skeptically.

The woman sensed she was losing his interest—Castiel, at this point, wasn’t even sure if he had shown any interest at all—because she sighed heavily, sounding like she did _not_ have the time for this. _Excuse you, princess_. “Come say hello or we’ll find you and rip your boyfriend’s throat out.”

“Better,” Castiel commended, rolling his eyes.

“Meet us at—”

“I know where you are,” Castiel responded, and then hung up. He turned to face the general direction of the Winchester brothers, who were both staring at him with equal expressions of _what the fuck was that about?_ , but Castiel was too afraid to properly look at them for fear of catching their eyes, so he instead ducked for the trunk and said, “I’ve been invited into the clubhouse. Definitely a trap. Cover me.”

“What?” Dean demanded incredulously, but Castiel was already striding for the warehouse, a gun held loosely in his fingers. He barely made it three steps before Dean’s hand closed around his elbow and gave him a rough tug, turning him back around, and bringing him close enough to Dean’s body that he had no choice but to look directly into his eyes.

He was angry, and he was hurt. He looked confused, and terrified. Castiel’s chest tightened uncomfortably.

“Stop,” Dean told him, practically begging him, his tone wobbling under the pressure Dean puts on himself to be aloof. Castiel watched Dean struggle under the weight of his own expectations for himself, of the expectations John Winchester had laid on him from childhood until the day he died, and he couldn’t help but to think that, after this passed, the three of them deserved a goddamn break. Maybe to a beach, or to a snow-topped mountain; but it was nothing short of unquestionable that they deserved a fucking vacation.

Castiel slowly reached out and put his hand over Dean’s, still gripping his arm. Dean relaxed his hold, moving his fingers so that their fingers slotted together. He squeezed his hand tight, so tight that Castiel’s hand was pretty uncomfortable but he would never think about moving it when Dean was looking at him like that, so confused and heartbroken but angry and upset all at once, not knowing what emotion he wanted to be but knowing that he still wanted to protect Castiel and didn’t want to let him self-destruct—Castiel appreciated that little thing. He was losing himself in a pool of helplessness and self-deprecation, and it helped to know that Dean would at least try to pull him out of the water if he saw him drowning.

“Stop, okay?” Dean murmured low enough that Castiel pretended like Sam couldn’t hear them. Dean seemed to be in the same mindset, because he continued on to say, “I don’t want to lose you just because we’re angry.”

Castiel, at first, didn’t say anything. He just looked Dean in the eye, considering what he was thinking, wondering how their lives had ever gotten to this point—chewed up and spit out, playing this strange tug-o-war game with each other over who was right and who was wronged—and Castiel suddenly wanted more than he has ever wanted anything that their lives could go back to the way things were, back before the psychic kids and the demon deals, back when it was just the three of them getting to know each other on the road. Back to when everything was simple, and Castiel fell in love with Dean the same way anything living needs air to breathe.

Castiel could still remember seeing Dean for the first time in the Roadhouse, still remembered talking to them that night, and he can still imagine the way that the lights had hit Dean’s smile and the way his throat moved when he took a swig of beer and how his knuckles had been bruised and Castiel could feel his heart beating just as quickly again.

Castiel loved Dean. But it was the hardest thing in the world to know that, if Dean had to pick one to live, Castiel or Sam, he would hesitate.

And he didn’t blame him for that. Castiel knew what he was signing up for. But it didn’t help that Castiel was absolutely terrified that, after what happened earlier tonight, that it would come to the point that Dean would never be able to forgive him for siding with the angels to stop Sam or to end his life, even if Castiel never would have pulled the trigger. He was afraid that Dean would see him as a traitor.

Castiel felt like he had been this weird addition to the Winchester family since the very beginning, never truly fitting in but along for the ride anyway. And he wouldn’t be able to live if he was casted away from them. He wouldn’t know what to do, knowing that every road he took would always end up with him horrifically alone.

Castiel looked at Dean, and he took a deep breath.

“Okay,” he whispered softly, squeezing Dean’s hand so, so tight. “Okay. What do we do?”

Dean closed his eyes slowly, bone-aching relief spreading across his face, and Castiel knew instantly that he had made the right choice.

*

He walked into the warehouse alone.

“And the guest of honor arrives,” the woman from the phone, a forty-something soccer mom, grated out, smirking up at him from where she was standing at the bottom of the rickety steel stairs, in the large clearing of a warehouse long since emptied. She crossed her arms over her chest as she watched him approach, her gaze hungry. “It’s nice to meet you, angel boy. What brings you to this part of town?”

“Well, you kept killing men of religion,” Castiel pointed out as he reached the main floor of the warehouse, spreading his arms. “I can take a hint.”

“That’s when even the best killers get caught, right?” she sighed overdramatically, playing the game for as long as she could. Castiel was entirely over it. “But you’re right, Castiel. I did hope to lure you here. And do you know why?”

“You mentioned my angel friends,” he replied, “but I don’t really care what you have to say; I’m just here to kill you.”

She laughed like he caught her off guard. Like there would be any other reason why he would be there.

“Oh, no, Castiel,” she urged him, trying to control her expression, but her mouth kept twitching up into a smile just aching to turn into a laugh. “I think you’ll want to hear about this. Do you think you know the angel’s plan for you, and those Winchesters that you run with?”

“I’m taking it a day at a time,” he responded.

“You wouldn’t be if you knew how many seals were broken already.”

This caught Castiel up. He looked at her carefully, considering, before he asked, “How many?”

“We’re gaining on the mid-six hundreds,” she enlightened him, smiling gleefully when he allowed his surprise to show. She flipped her hair over her shoulder, tilting her head as she analyzed him, before she suddenly announced, “You should have come here alone.”

“I did,” he corrected her patiently.

The door at the top of the stairs burst open, and the Winchester brothers were manhandled through by three demons, who were herding them toward the stairs. Castiel scowled up at them, but Sam was already wearing a signature bitch-face.

“Great plan, Dean,” Sam remarked in irritation. Dean looked unperturbed.

“Well, nobody bats one thousand,” he replied to his moody brother calmly, focusing his attention on descending the stairs. He reached the bottom and was stopped forcefully by one of the demons, so that they stood on the edge of the action, several steps from where Castiel and the unnamed woman were standing. He nodded to them like they were high school buddies that had run into each other at Starbucks.

Castiel looked at the woman. She was appraising the three of them curiously, as if studying their dynamic. If she noticed anything interesting, she didn’t say anything about it, only looking over to one of the demons and asking, “You get the knife?”

The demon held it up. She grinned, pleased.

“You know what’s funny?” she asked the hostages.

“That you’re wearing a soccer mom?” Dean replied. She ignored him.

“I was actually bummed to get this detail, picking up a vessel and cutting a few throats, waiting on orders,” she explained, shrugging pleasantly. “And then look what happened. Look who’s fallen into my lap.”

Castiel eyed her closely. He didn’t like this setup. He didn’t like the odds.

“Now for the punch line,” the woman announced happily, and pulled out a gun that she immediately pointed at Castiel, clicking a bullet into the chamber. She grinned. “Everyone dies. Time to go back home, Castiel.”

Castiel paused. And then he launched himself at her.

The gun went off, but it missed, and he managed to wrestle the demon to the ground. He heard Dean yell, and a scuffle broke out among the Winchesters and their captures, but Castiel paid them no mind, knowing they would be able to hold their own. The woman cried out, outraged, as Castiel ripped the gun from her hand and managed to send it skittering to the other side of the room before she dove at him with her claw-like nails, and he grabbed her by the wrists and pinned her, managing to stay in position even as she shrieked and thrashed, trying to get him to dismount.

“Cas,” Dean called, and Castiel freed one of her hands for just long enough to catch the demon-killing knife as it soared through the air, stabbing her into the chest before she could land a blow that would send him down for the count. He staggered back onto his feet and aimed for a split second before throwing the knife, lodging it into the back of one of the two remaining demons, the one fighting Dean, and he was dead before he hit the ground. Dean and Castiel caught each other’s eye as Castiel bent down to retrieve the knife, their silent questions of if they were okay hanging between them, before the shrill, horrified screams of a demon cut through their moment, and they both spun in the direction of the sound.

One of the demons, a woman, was on the ground, bleeding, wounded. And Sam was holding her down, pinning her, but, as Castiel watched with horrified eyes, his stomach sinking down below the center of the earth and out the other side, Sam brought his mouth to a wound on her throat and started frantically drinking her blood.

Castiel knew something had to be wrong. He knew that the angels would be uneasy with the idea of Sam killing demons with his mind, that his stunt with Alastair would have been a step too far. But he never would have thought that, all of this, would have led him here—standing in the middle of a fight, staring at his best friend as he sucked the blood out of a demon, a monster in the place of where a human should be.

Castiel couldn’t explain the horror he felt, nothing but cold and stomach-turning and horrible and he wanted to look at Dean but absolutely did _not_ want to see what Dean’s face would look like. Sam saved him from looking by jerking his head up, as if feeling their eyes on him, and he took one look at them before he pushed the writhing demon away as she clutched at her throat, getting to his feet and reaching one hand out, palm flat. She twitched, letting out another scream before the black smoke billowed from her throat and sunk down into the ground, returning to the place in which she came.

And Castiel felt like he was going to start screaming.

He’d thought that Sam killing demons with his mind was inhuman. He didn’t even know what this was.

This was worse than a demon, than any other monster.

Castiel now understood why the angels felt that Sam Winchester would have to die if he could not be saved.

This was more than dangerous.

For a long moment, they stood in a silence alone, standing frozen and not knowing what to say in the middle of a room of blood and bodies, a demon hunt well done with a twist ending that made none of the work feel worth it at all. Castiel wanted to throw up. But, more than anything, he just wanted to ask Sam why he would ever think he had to go this far.

He didn’t. Instead, Castiel met Dean’s eyes before he turned away, sliding the demon-killing knife into his back pocket, and he headed for the stairs consumed with the thought that he may actually have to kill Sam.

After a few seconds, Dean followed him. And, after that, Sam trailed behind.

They didn’t speak for a long time.

*

They made it about an hour out, all of them sitting in a heavy silence as Dean drove the Impala through the rain on a lonely two-lane highway, before Sam, sitting in his typical co-pilot spot in the passenger seat, said, “Alright, let’s hear it.”

“What?” Dean asked.

“Drop the bomb, man. You saw what I did. Come on, stop the car, take a swing,” Sam urged him, gesturing toward his face. “I’m sure both of you want to.”

Castiel didn’t say anything. He just stared at him.

“I’m not gonna take a swing,” Dean told him calmly.

“Then scream,” Sam almost pleaded, desperation leaking into his tone. “Chew me out!”

“I’m not mad, Sam,” Dean replied measuredly. Sam gaped at him, disbelieving.

“Come _on_. You’re not mad?”

“Nope.”

“Right,” Sam muttered, closing his eyes. “Look, at least let me explain myself.”

“Don’t,” Dean told him, still facing forward, not taking his eyes off the road. “I don’t care.”

“ _You don’t care_?” Sam echoed, flabbergasted.

“What do you want me to say, that I’m disappointed? Yeah, I am. But mostly, I’m just tired, man. I’m done. I am just done.”

Castiel felt a pang of pain in his ribcage. Dean was so resigned, so destroyed. This was a man staring down the barrel of a gun, and he didn’t care anymore. He wasn’t going to fight. He was willing to lie down and take it, because this was just too much, and he didn’t even feel the sting of his brother’s betrayal because he was too broken to remember what it’s like to feel.

Castiel knew a lot about what that felt like. He just had hoped that maybe he would be able to save Dean from as much of it as he could.

Before Sam could answer, his cell phone started ringing. He hesitated, considering answering it, before he fumbled for the device, pinching the bridge of his nose between two fingers as he used the other hand to answer the call, his voice shaking as he greeted, “Hey, Bobby.”

Sam listened for a moment before he asked, “What’s going on?” and ended up hanging up another couple of seconds later, rubbing at his face in an attempt to compose himself. Dean glanced over at him, one of the first times he had looked at him since they had left the warehouse.

“What’d he say?” Dean demanded when Sam focused too much attention on putting his phone back in his pocket.

“Wants us to get to his place as soon as possible,” Sam mumbled back, turning to stare out the window, his shoulders caving. Dean glanced at him again before straightening his own back, pressing down a little harder on the accelerator.

“Good thing we were heading in that direction, then,” Dean commented before he turned on a rock record, and they all returned back to their thoughts.

*

“Well, thanks for shaking tail,” Bobby commented as the four of them made their way downstairs into the cellar, the door to the panic room standing open. Sam was leading the pack, heading for the room. Castiel watched him, hanging back, lately fearful of a devil’s trap.

“Yeah, you got it,” Dean replied, distracted.

Sam paused in the doorway, turning to hook a gaze over his shoulder. Bobby gestured for him to move forward.

“Go inside,” the older man communicated. “I wanna show you something.”

Sam stepped into the panic room, glancing around, expecting to find articles and pictures hanging off the walls, signs of the research Bobby was so obviously doing. Dean and Bobby hesitated, hanging back. Castiel just stood in the background, as he was so well with doing, and watched.

“Alright, so, uh, what’s the big demon problem?” Sam asked, his back to the doorway.

“You are,” Bobby told him, and Dean slammed the door in between him and his brother, locking it for good. Sam spun around, his eyes wide with shock, and he took large steps to the barred window, his surprise genuine and startled. He looked like a little kid that just got blindsided by life. Castiel looked away as Bobby grated as calmly as he could, “This is for your own good.”

“Guys?” Sam asked, but Dean was already walking away, walking up to Castiel and hooking a finger in the sleeve of his jacket, wordlessly tugging him closer. Castiel shifted, weary of Dean’s emotionless stare, his perfect poker face that started to break when Sam’s pleads turned scared, desperate, and he called, “Hey, hey, what’s going on? Dean?”

Bobby slammed the window on the door shut and latched it.

“This isn’t funny!” Sam’s panicked yells continued, rising in volume as he became frantic for them to hear him. “Guys! Hey! Guys? Dean?”

Bobby walked up the steps. For a second, Castiel and Dean just stood there, not touching but close enough that the fabric of their jackets touched when they breathed, the two of them listening to Sam’s shouts and pleads, until Castiel reached a hand out and took Dean’s, pulling him up the stairs, because he didn’t need to hear this, he didn’t _deserve_ to hear this, and Castiel knew that he was losing him, that maybe Dean was even already lost, but he wasn’t going to stop trying to take care of him, would never think about stopping loving him, so he did what he could, so they returned upstairs to the next piece of their unknown.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> x Slang


	24. When The Levee Breaks

“This is not funny,” Sam said shakily.

Castiel stood at the window on the other side of the door, looking in. Sam was shaking, sweating. He looked freaked. Castiel didn’t like looking in on Sam like this, through bars. Nothing about this felt right.

“This _isn’t_ funny,” Castiel agreed easily. Sam stared at him, wide-eyed and panicked, and Castiel was relieved he hadn’t allowed Dean to come down here like he had wanted to. Castiel didn’t want Dean to have to see his brother beg for mercy like this. It was practically torture, what they were doing to him, but the positive, necessary kind. Castiel wanted to spare Dean from it as much as he possibly could.

“Look, I’m sorry, okay?” Sam stammered. “I shouldn’t have lied to you, I’m sorry. Just open the door.”

“None of us are opening this door until you dry out.”

“Are you really trying to twist this into some kind of ridiculous drug intervention?”

“If it smells like a duck.” Castiel couldn’t look at him.

“Cas, come on, I’m not doing this for kicks. Soon, I’m gonna be strong enough to kill Lilith.”

“Strong,” Castiel repeated, and then laughed sourly. “No, Sam. That’s not strength. That’s just unnatural. You should have known better.”

“I know that’s what you want too,” Sam argued loudly, shouting like he was trying to get Castiel to listen, and he ripped his gaze from over Sam’s shoulder to his eyes, saw the frenzied anxiety that Sam was trying to bite back. Castiel had never pitied a Winchester as much as he did Sam right now.

“I do want to see Lilith dead,” Castiel agreed slowly, carefully choosing his words, “but not like this, Sam. I didn’t want her dead at the cost of your soul—because you know what this is, right? Drinking demon blood? That’s a one-way ticket to Hell, Sam. That’s the same fate that I died to save you from, and you’ve gone and landed yourself there anyway. I couldn’t possibly be more angry with you right now.”

“Are you so busy being self-righteous that you forgot about what matters?” Sam demanded, getting angry, too. “Killing Lilith matters! Without Lilith in the picture, the apocalypse isn’t going to happen. We can save everyone. You’re the one that can make that choice.”

“You’re right,” Castiel said. “Interesting how, if that’s the case, I still choose to keep you in this cage.”

“You can’t kill her without me!”

“I can, and we will. Bobby, Dean, and I will kill her. Congrats, Sam—you just bought yourself a benchwarmer seat to the apocalypse.”

“Cas,” Sam said, but Castiel was sick of listening, sick of feeling sick, so he shut the grated window in between them and latched it, but could still hear Sam’s muffled shouts. “Cas, don’t! Wait, no, please, Cas! Let me out of here! Let me out! Cas! Dean!”

“I’m sorry, Sam,” Castiel called to him, his voice shaking with the effort to keep himself from falling to pieces. “I tried to save you. I really did. This is the only way I can keep trying.”

“Cas!” Sam screamed again, but Castiel was already heading for the steps, and he forced himself to pretend not to hear the desperate screaming that he left in his wake.

*

They could hear Sam screaming from inside of the house. Dean had looked like he was going to be sick for hours now. His elbows were on the table, his head in his hands. His shoulders were tensed. He looked terrorized, tortured, and the worried grip on Castiel’s stomach only tightened when Sam’s screams gave way to _No please Alastair no get away no!_

“How long are we going to keep him like that?” Dean asked, sounding terrorized, without picking his head up. Bobby, who was sitting at the phone, scoffed, looking like he had aged five years in the hours since they had shown up at his door with the plan to betray Sam.

“No telling how long it’ll take,” Bobby answered him truthfully, but not really looking at him when he continued, “Hell, there’s no way to tell if Sam’ll even survive it. We just gotta wait it out.”

Dean didn’t respond. Castiel reached up and massaged his temples, a headache as horrible as Hell pulsing, bad enough to the point that Castiel was sure he was hearing words in his own head, like a schizophrenic, but he had to be imagining them through shots of pain, had to be driving himself mad with all of this apocalypse shit . . .

Bobby hung up the phone from what sounded like a bickering argument before crossing the room to turn on the news. Dean lifted his head to follow him, his expression strained as Sam’s screaming continued. Castiel turned despite the pounding in his head and looked with him.

“Key West sees ten species go extinct,” Dean read from the headlines, his eyes flashing to Bobby. “This is what Rufus called about?”

“Yup,” Bobby responded, not taking his eyes off of the screen. His frown deepened. “Plus Alaska—fifteen-man fishing crew all stricken blind, cause unknown. New York—teacher goes postal, locks the door, and kills exactly sixty-six kids. All of this in a single day. I looked them up, and there’s no doubt about it. They’re all seals. Breaking. Fast.”

“How many are left?” Dean asked.

“Nine,” Castiel whispered through frozen lips, the pounding turning into screaming, the possible voices turning into angels whispering. Black patches covered his gaze and he would have stumbled if he was standing, but instead he just swayed dangerously, reaching out to grab the table with one hand while bringing the other to rub at his forehead, seeking any kind of relief. The heat flared again, and Castiel gasped for air before he said, “Eight.”

“Cas?” Dean demanded, getting to his feet so abruptly that the chair wobbled. Castiel forced himself to open his eyes, blinking through the light to blearily stare at Dean, before suddenly—like ears popping on an airplane, everything suddenly became clear. The headache vanished. The pounding was gone.

Left in its wake was the constant whispers of angels in the back of his head.

“Oh god,” Castiel groaned, reaching up to bury his face in his hands. “Not this shit again, you can’t be serious.”

“What? Cas, you have to talk to me.”

“The fucking angels just installed angel radio into the back of my skull. I can hear them talking.”

Dean blinked. Bobby just said, “As useful as that is, you gotta admit this Righteous Man thing keeps getting weirder and weirder.”

“You’re telling me,” Castiel responded. “It’s getting close, though. The apocalypse. The angels can feel it. It’s making them restless. There’s nothing they can do to stop it. It’s falling into place too fast.”

“Where the hell are your angel pals?” Bobby demanded, probably meaning Anna in particular, but it had been days since Castiel had last heard from her, so he couldn’t offer a better answer than a shaking head and a frustrated sigh.

For a moment, they were quiet, paying attention to the news as they talked about the breaking story—an explosion on a busy street of Philadelphia—while Castiel tried to focus on his own thoughts rather than the distant murmur of angels in the back of his head, the unwelcome presence nearly making him sick. Thankfully, it was easy enough for him not to pay attention to, with so many other things to focus on, so he just sat, terrified, stewing in his own juices with Dean and Bobby while the news reporters lost their minds trying to explain the mayhem. Part of him just wanted to scream.

He was losing control of his entire life, and quickly. He could feel it spiraling out of control, like an airplane with one engine, cork-screwing out of the sky. And he was tired. He was so bone-achingly tired.

Castiel remembered when Sam had died and Bobby had referred to the demons escaping the gate as the world ending. He remembered the raw pain and defeat and exhaustion in Dean’s voice when he had screamed _Then let it end!_ That was what Castiel was feeling right now. Raw. Pained. Defeated. Exhausted.

The world was ready. Castiel was almost just ready to let it end.

Hadn’t he given enough? Hadn’t he lost enough?

Castiel knew he could lose so, so much more in this fight. He didn’t know if he was willing to take that risk anymore. He wasn’t sure if it was even worth it.

But of course he didn’t say that out loud.

Instead, he let Bobby fill the silence as he cautiously began, “The apocalypse being nigh and all—is now really the right time to be having this little domestic drama of ours?”

Dean’s face darkened as he asked, “What do you mean?”

“Well, I don’t like this anymore than you do, but Sam can kill demons,” Bobby pointed out gingerly. “He’s got a shot at stopping Armageddon.”

“So what?” Dean replied, hostility closing off the other emotions on his face. “Sacrifice Sam’s life, his soul, for the greater good? Is that what you’re saying? Times are bad, so let’s use Sam as a nuclear warhead?”

“Look, I know you hate me for suggesting it. I hate me for suggesting it,” Bobby told him, defeated too. “I love that boy like a son. All I’m saying is maybe he’s here right now instead of on the battlefield because we love him too much.”

Dean didn’t say anything for a few seconds. And then he whispered, “Cas?”

“The angels want to put Sam in the ground for what he’s doing,” Castiel murmured, suddenly so unsure. “I don’t know what to think anymore, but I don’t think that any of this is good.”

“Then what do we do?” Dean asked him, getting desperate. His hands were shaking when he threw them up in the air, rounding on Castiel, needing to take his aggression out on something and he was there. Castiel felt his chest constricting. “You have to have some idea, Cas. You’re the guy that’s supposed to be able to end it. You gotta tell me something here. I’m drowning, man. You can’t just keep telling me nothing because I need _something_.”

Bobby, never one to be vulnerable, let the anguish distort his face. It took all of Castiel’s control to keep his face flat, calm.

“You want to know what I think?” Castiel demanded, standing and facing Dean, an unstoppable force and an unmovable object about to collide. “I think that everything I’m fighting for is in this house. I think that, if the world hangs in the balance of me picking sides, then fuck Heaven, and fuck Hell. I choose us. Screw the angels and the demons—I don’t believe in them. I believe in us. We’ll just have to do what we think is right, and make it up as we go along. Just like we always have.”

The smile started slowly, but soon it was spreading across Dean’s face, shaping his eyes. Relief and gratitude and love and loyalty all rolled into one turn of the lips, one intensity of a gaze, and Castiel committed that smile to memory. It was more than a ton weight off of his shoulders to see Dean smile again.

“You heard the man,” Dean told Bobby, a new energy to his voice, a new determination in the way he held his shoulders. “Cas is right—if anyone can do it, it’s us. And, right now, we need to focus on letting Sam get better.”

Bobby looked like he was tempted to argue, but conceded with a sigh and a head nod before moving back to his desk, looking through a book about any information about demon blood consumption. Dean reached out and squeezed Castiel’s hand, offering him a small thankful smile before he let go and moved back to join his father figure. Castiel paused, no sure what he could possibly do at this point, before he turned back to the television and watched as his time ran out.

 _Seven_ , an angel whispered in the back of his mind, and Castiel got back to work.

~*~

Castiel didn’t remember falling asleep, but he would never forget when he woke up. There was nothing as horrible as Dean’s hand shaking his shoulder frantically, to opening his eyes and seeing Dean’s face, pale and panicked, hovering over him. Castiel sat up quickly, knowing something had gone so wrong, and if it weren’t for the chattering angels in his head, Castiel would have thought the world was coming to an end.

“Dean?” he asked, his heartbeat speeding up. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s Sam,” Dean said, his face green and guarded and just terrified enough that he couldn’t hide it, his voice nearly cracking on Sam’s name. Dean had to take a moment to clear his throat and dart his eyes away, reaching up a shaking hand to run through his hair, before he managed to grate out, “He’s gone.”

It took a second. And then Castiel demanded sharply, “What?”

“He’s disappeared,” Dean said, glancing toward the door. “Come on.”

Castiel was on his feet in a moment and rushing after Dean, tucking his gun into his back waistband, trying to turn his head around everything, trying not to feel his own spiking fear as he thought about all of the things Sam might do now that he was free. Castiel was probably just as terrified as Dean. He didn’t know where Sam drew the line anymore. He didn’t know what his best friend would be willing to do if it meant stabbing Lilith through the heart.

Sam certainly didn’t seem to have any qualms about knocking Bobby out and stealing one of his cars.

“How the hell did he get out?” Castiel demanded as he jumped the bottom two steps to the basement. Bobby was standing with a nice new shiny red bruise on his forehead and a giant scowl on his face, shooting Castiel just a sliver of it before he turned to open the door, which was still locked from the outside. Dean was standing beside him, looking just as confused. The door swung open, and Bobby glanced around.

“Maybe he had help,” he said, pointing. “Room’s full of busted devil’s traps.”

“Ruby,” Castiel said.

“That’d be my guess.”

“How did she even touch the door?” Dean demanded.

“You think she’s got the mojo?”

“No way,” Castiel said, looking sideways toward Dean, not liking the feeling of his stomach dropping through the center of the earth. “I doubt there’s many demons with that kind of power.”

“Well, how he got gone isn’t as important as where he’s gone to,” Bobby pointed out, swinging the door back shut. It slammed with a loud bang.

“I hope he’s with Ruby,” Dean admitted suddenly, his eyes dark, “because killing that lying bitch is the second thing on my to-do list.”

Castiel didn’t even have the time to ask before Dean was storming up the stairs, his boots loud and heavy and his moves made in nothing but anger. Castiel met Bobby’s eyes before the both of them moved to fall into step behind him, trying to catch up with him. Dean had stopped in the living room, and was shoving handfuls of his dirty clothes into his pack.

“Let’s go, Cas,” he said without looking at him, but Castiel didn’t move. He just looked at Bobby.

“Dean, if Sam doesn’t want to be found, he’s going to be damn near impossible to find,” Bobby reminded him, trying so hard to hide how worried he was, but Castiel has learned to understand a lot about desperation, about terror. Bobby was terrified. He was staring down the barrel of a gun and he was watching the two boys that he practically considered his own sons walking into fates that would more than likely kill them both, and he was _terrified_. Castiel suddenly felt like he should stay here—that he should stand with Bobby because Dean and Sam were always too busy trying to fight at another front line, because Bobby didn’t deserve to have to handle this all on his own—but he knew he couldn’t.

Castiel knew that he couldn’t let Dean do this, knowing what it could mean the same way Bobby did. So Castiel wasn’t surprised when Dean turned around with a dark expression and looked at Bobby for a long moment, pausing to make sure the weight of his words would sink them past the floorboards, before he replied, “Yeah. We’ll see.”

He grabbed his bag and said again, “Cas.”

Castiel paused. And then he grabbed his own bag, always packed for disaster, from the other side of the couch, barely managing to shoot Bobby a reassuring smile before Dean was storming out of the front door. Castiel was about to follow behind him before Bobby reached out and grabbed his arm, stopping him in his tracks, cracks in his mask beginning to shine through with the worry of a parent watching a child go off to war.

“Do what you can,” Bobby told him, not needing to elaborate, and Castiel nodded as Bobby let him go, taking a step away. With nothing more to be said, Castiel turned and passed through the front door, wondering if he would ever see this house again, wondering if this would be the time that he and Dean left that they would not return. Dean was already in the car, so Castiel just slide into the passenger side, throwing his bag into the backseat, and he forced himself not to look back as they sped off, not letting himself think what was sinking into his stomach as horrified realization.

In the next few days, Castiel knew he was going to die.

He hoped with everything he had that he was wrong. But, somehow, he knew that he wasn’t.

That made it so much worse when he said out loud, without seeming to realize it, “Six.”

~*~

Bobby called them before they were out of Sioux Falls about his missing car just being found in Jamestown, North Dakota, and the cars that were stolen after the fact. Dean pointed them in the right direction immediately, waiting an hour into their drive before having Castiel work as the middle man between him and Bobby, relaying information about where the hell they could find Sam. They were circling the north of Jamestown when Bobby called again to say that the police found the Escalade abandoned outside of Elk River, a few hours away, and Dean was on the road in a matter of seconds. Bobby called twenty minutes later to say that a town called Cold Springs not too far away was lighting up with demon signs.

Dean barely spoke the entire ride, when it wasn’t words meant for Bobby. They drove in complete silence. When they started passing signs saying Cold Springs was only a handful of miles away, Castiel shifted so he could look at Dean, every passing mile feeling like a death sentence.

“Bobby wanted me to remind you of something,” Castiel blurted, not really the way he wanted to broach the topic, but abrupt and honest wasn’t much of a bad policy for this intervention. Dean’s eyes flashed to him before going back to the road. His fingers tightened slightly on the wheel.

“Okay,” he said, urging Castiel to keep going. Pacified that he would at least be listening, Castiel took a deep breath.

“Finding Sam?” Castiel said. “This is about bringing him back, not pushing him away. It’s bringing him home, not making him dangerous.”

Dean didn’t say anything.

“Dean, you have to listen to me. I know you’re mad. You’re right to be. I’m just saying—be good to him. Get _through_ to him. He’ll listen if you try to talk to him. He always has. You know how bad the flip side will get if you let it. But you can still talk him down from this suicide mission.”

“I’m hearing you, Cas,” Dean snapped impatiently, irritated. Castiel raised his eyebrows, a challenge. Dean didn’t even notice.

Castiel turned and looked out the window thankful that, at least, the angel radio was easy to ignore. It felt less like schizophrenia and more like he was turning a radio off and on, like he could raise the volume with his own will and silence it when he so desired. It was a nice touch to an entirely shitty conversation.

He was listening to an angel on Earth reporting the death of another fallen brother when Dean pulled sharply into the parking lot of a hotel, throwing the car into park. He didn’t even spare Castiel a glance before he climbed out of the car, reaching behind him to make sure his weapons were there, before he announced, “This is it. He’d pick this one.”

“It’s impractical,” Castiel pointed out.

“Exactly. Opposite day. He’ll even be in some pretentious room. Something with a kitchen or a honeymoon suite or something—honeymoon. Probably that. You coming or not?”

Castiel had paused, watching Dean boil from across the hood of the car, but he shook himself out of it to close the door behind him instead, allowing Dean to lock it, before he said, “Let’s go.”

~*~

Sure as anything, they watched Sam leave the honeymoon suite from around the corner, pausing for a few moments to make sure he out of sight before they moved for the door, noticing Sam didn’t lock it on his way out, pausing to meet each other’s eyes before Dean pushed it open, strolling cautiously inside with Castiel hot on his heels.

Ruby looked up from where she was standing with her arms crossed at the edge of the bed, a scowl on her face. It immediately darkened when she saw them, her lip curling distastefully.

Dean pulled the demon knife from his jacket pocket in the same breath he said, “You fucking demon bitch.”

Ruby made a grab for her own weapon at the same time Sam walked back into the room, oblivious. He stopped short, his eyes widening when he took in the scene around him, but he almost didn’t look surprised to see Dean, like he knew himself that, if anyone would be able to find him when he was on the run, _of course_ it would be Dean. Dean cut his angry gaze between Ruby and Sam, like he was unsure which one he wanted to stab first.

Sam seemed to sense danger afoot, because he raised his hands toward Dean and urged him, “Just take it easy.”

“Well, it must’ve been some party you two had going, considering how hard you tried to keep me from crashing it. Solid try,” Dean added sarcastically.

“Dean, I’m glad you’re here,” Sam said, not looking like he was lying but not seeming entirely truthful, either. “Look, let’s just talk about this.”

“As soon as she’s dead,” Dean replied, gesturing to Ruby with his knife, “we can talk all you want.”

“Ruby, get out of here,” Sam told her.

“No, she’s not going anywhere,” Dean protested.

“Dean,” Castiel said, his first word since stepping through the door, and the brothers both looked to him, Ruby glancing at him nervously from the side of her gaze. Castiel raised his hands to show that he wasn’t presently armed, and nodded his head to silently ask Ruby to leave with him. She narrowed her eyes distrustfully, glancing back at Sam. Something about his gaze must have convinced her—Castiel didn’t look away from her face—because she squared her jaw and nodded once back, and they both moved out of the door.

Castiel closed it behind them. He figured he would give the brothers some time to duke it out, to fight and yell and argue about it until they couldn’t catch their breath, and then he would go back in and make them both see reason. He turned back to Ruby—she was watching him carefully, seemingly just waiting to see him pull out an angel blade to stab her with.

But his fight was not with her right now. Right now, she was a nonentity, and Castiel couldn’t give a shit about her.

That didn’t stop him from declaring, as the voices in the room, muffled, got louder, “I don’t trust you.”

She raised her eyebrows and said nothing.

“I don’t have the energy to kill you right now,” he continued to confess, “but, if I did, you wouldn’t be breathing right now. Abandon this—whatever the fuck this is. Walk away. Because if I see you within ten feet of the Winchester brothers again, I’m going to slit your fucking throat. Understood?”

“I’ve seen you this desperate before,” she observed, tilting her head to the side, her lips curling into a snide smirk. “The last time you talked like this, you knew you were going to die.”

Castiel didn’t say anything, but it didn’t matter. She knew.

“Night, Castiel,” she said, winking. “See you soon.”

And then she turned around and walked away.

He watched her leave for a second, considering chasing her down, considering just killing her anyway. But he knew that he had to be where he was, that he couldn’t leave this suite, because everything was either about to get so much better or so, so much worse. So he took a deep breath, steeling his own nerves and soothing his own shaking hands, before he pushed his way back through the door and straight into an argument fueled by hatred, love, and fear.

“I’m the only one that can do this,” Sam was pleading with Dean. The demon-killing knife was on the bed. They both did not appear to be armed. Still, Castiel stood alert by the door, making sure it was sealed shut beside him before he hovered there uncertainly, not wanting to stand in on a personal moment but knowing that nothing would get done if he just let the Winchesters boys duke it out forever.

“No,” Dean said. “You’re not the one who’s gonna do this.”

Castiel assumed they were talking about killing Lilith, because Sam let out a sudden laugh.

“Right, that’s right, I forgot,” Sam responded with acid. “The angels think it’s Cas, and you think it’s you.”

“You don’t think we can?”

“No. You can’t. You’re not strong enough.”

“And who the hell are you?”

“I’m being practical here. I’m doing what needs to be done.”

“Yeah? You’re not gonna do a single damn thing.”

“Stop bossing me around, Dean!” Sam suddenly exploded. “Look—my whole life, you take the wheel, you call the shots, and I trust you because you’re my brother. Now, I’m asking you, just once—trust me.”

“No,” Dean said, and Castiel felt that seal the fate of everything that would happen tonight, felt it like the earth splitting open under his feet. “You don’t know what you’re doing, Sam.”

“Yes, I do!”

“Then that’s worse!”

“Why? Look, I’m telling you—”

“Because it’s not something that you’re doing, it’s what you are! It means—”

Dean suddenly stopped. He went pale.

“What?” Sam demanded, his tone dangerous, but there were tears in his eyes. “No. Say it.”

So Dean did, because he always knew it would go this far, because he and Castiel both knew that, when they got in the car, they would not be bringing Sam home. They would be starting a war.

And so, Dean said, “It means you’re a monster.”

For a moment, Castiel thought that words would break Sam apart. And then Sam threw a wicked punch, sending Dean down hard, but not for long before Dean was bounding back up and swinging his own fist, and the fight escalated so fast that Castiel didn’t even have the time to try and stop them before their bodies were flying and glass was shattering and his yells weren’t heard over their anger, their hatred. Within fifteen seconds, Sam was dominating, and he pinned Dean the second Dean didn’t get up fast enough, his hand around his throat. Castiel yelled _Stop_ but it was as if Sam couldn’t hear him, was only looking at his brother with eyes nothing like the ones Castiel associated with his best friend. Dean stared at him, too, like he didn’t know him anymore. And then Sam let go, and got to his feet. Dean did not, his face bloodied.

“You don’t know me,” Sam said lowly. “You never did. And you never will.”

Sam turned and walked toward the door. He stopped in his tracks the second Dean spoke.

“You walk out that door, don’t you ever come back!” Dean yelled at him, voice thick with the blood dripping from his mouth, and Castiel felt his whole body go cold. Sam stopped walking. Castiel, practically facing him, saw the look of sadness, the look of another time when another elder Winchester had screamed the same words at him when he walked out in search of a better life, but now he was walking into something he didn’t know if he could control, something dangerous, something exactly like what he had been running from—and Castiel saw him break, just enough, that he saw the human underneath. And then Sam straightened up, squaring his jaw, and took another step.

This time, Castiel mirrored his movements, coming to stand in front of the door. This time, Castiel reached for the gun behind him.

“Get out of my way, Cas,” Sam growled, a muscle in his jaw jumping, his bloodied hands curling like he was willing to take a swing at Castiel, too. But Castiel did not flinch. He did not deviate.

Before he could talk himself out of it, he raised the gun and pointed it at Sam’s heart.

Sam’s face clouded with surprise. Dean moved, unable to see what was happening. Castiel kept his face blank, terror running through his veins, Anna’s voice in the back of his mind reminding him, _Or we will_.

“What are you doing, Cas?” Sam demanded, his voice surprised and fearful. Castiel clicked a bullet into the chamber, his hand shaking, looking straight into his best friend’s eyes.

Dean’s body stilled. And then he was scrambling to his feet, teetering slightly in his rush, and his eyes were torn between being steeled and horrified when he spotted the gun, and when he realized what Castiel was considering doing.

Castiel looked back at Sam. It was in that moment he realized he was choked up, his eyes clouding. His body seemed to realize what he was doing before even his brain did.

“Are you going to kill me, Cas?” Sam asked, his voice soft. He wasn’t wavering, but he wasn’t going to fight him, either—his shoulders were falling, defeat curling into his posture. His eyes were still lit with the fire of anger, of vengeance, but there was also that small bit of sadness and fear that was enough to reach forward and squeeze Castiel’s heart in his chest, making it harder to breathe.

Dean didn’t move.

Castiel took a deep breath.

Sam just watched him. Waiting to see whose side he was on.

Castiel dropped the gun and stepped aside. He looked away, closing his eyes—he didn’t want to look at either of the brothers—so he couldn’t watch Sam walk away, but he heard his footsteps leave the room and then wander down the hallway, until they were too far away for him to here, and Sam felt like he was lost to them forever. Really, Cas knew that he was. Dean had gone too far, and then Castiel had gone even farther. Bobby had warned them not to push him away, but Dean and Castiel had done nothing but shove Sam past his breaking point, and now they were standing in the ruined room in the aftermath and Castiel had never felt so lost in his entire life.

He looked up at Dean, tears threatening to fall, and Dean was staring at him with an emotion that could never be mistaken as anything other than betrayal. As their eyes met, Dean looked away.

The levee had broken. And now, somewhere in the back of his mind, an angel whispered fearfully, “Five.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Four more chapters left. Oh boy.
> 
> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> x Slang


	25. I Solemnly Swear

“Dean.”

If only Castiel had a nickel for every time he said that name. He knew of a thousand moments of Dean’s name falling off of his lips, before and after, then and now. The night they met at the Roadhouse, Dean with his cocky smirk and reputation, total strangers but Castiel looking at him and feeling something, saying it with a smile—sitting on the hood of the Impala with Sam leaning against the bumper, laughing at one of his brother’s terrible jokes, muttering it in a scandalized laugh—Dean on his knees, cradling his brother’s lifeless body in his arms, lost, and Castiel touching his shoulders softly and whispering through the tears he was choking back—the first time he saw Dean again after he crawled out of the ground, thinking that this was his second chance, thinking that this time could mean something—

Dean wouldn’t look at him.

They had driven straight through the night until they reached Bobby’s again, Dean bloodied but refusing to admit he was hurting, not even letting Castiel come close enough to him to look at his injuries. Dean just drove on autopilot, his face a controlled mask of a man who was losing control, and Castiel hadn’t said anything, just sat as far away from him as possible on the seat and hadn’t said a word.

Bobby hadn’t had to ask what happened when Castiel and Dean walked through the door. He saw Castiel’s shame, and he saw Dean’s bruised face and his anger lingering dangerously just under the surface. Bobby just watched them storm over the threshold, not looking at each other, and move in different directions. Dean stormed to the kitchen, throwing open the fridge door in search of a beer, and Castiel not breaking pace until he was crashing down onto the sofa, pulling the nearest open book of research closer to him and starting to read. Castiel knew the Winchesters’ father figure wanted to ask, wanted to make sure they and Sam were going to be alright, but he didn’t, and he eventually settled down at his desk, consulting his own research, around the time that Dean downed his third beer.

Dean ended up stalking out of the back door, muttering some excuse about going to check on the ammo reserves, and Castiel watched him tug on his coat without looking behind him, his shoulders hunched like he could feel Castiel’s gaze. Castiel didn’t look away until Dean was out of sight, and then he just turned his head to Bobby, knowing the man was looking at him.

Bobby’s eyebrows were up. That seemed to be all the communication necessary.

“He was with Ruby,” Castiel explained choppily, staring down at the book in front of him without actually seeing anything. “Dean confronted him, and it turned violent. When Sam tried to leave, I—I held a gun to his head. For a minute, Bobby, I was going to kill him. Just shoot him, point-blank range. And then I realized what I was doing and let him go, but the way they both looked at me—Sam just looked so disappointed, and Dean looked like he didn’t know me—I don’t know. We all lost control of the situation and it went too far.”

“I wanted to know about that,” Bobby admitted slowly, his eyebrows only pulling up higher, “but that ain’t my only question.”

Castiel tilted his head, confused. The older man just heaved a sigh, like he couldn’t handle being around such idiots all the time. Castiel was a little offended, but couldn’t blame him.

“I might be old, but I ain’t blind,” Bobby pointed out. “I see the way you’re walking around like a dead man.”

Castiel didn’t say anything.

“Anything you wanna tell me, Cas?” Bobby asked him patiently, staring at him carefully from underneath the brim of his cap.

Castiel considered answering him for a moment, and then didn’t even know what he would say. What would he tell him? How he felt his will waning every day, his hope fading? How he couldn’t look at himself in the mirror without being sick? How he was self-destructing, losing control, and how he wouldn’t even blink if he was given the ultimatum of stopping the apocalypse even if it meant that he would burn for the rest of his days?

Bobby would worry about him, in his own way, and Castiel didn’t need the man to worry about one more thing on top of it all. So Castiel just smiled and shook his head, trying to reassure him the best he could, and probably only succeeding in making him even more nervous.

“I think I might just need some air,” Castiel told him, standing up, his skin itching with anxiety at the thought of being here when Dean got back, and that only solidified his decision. He scooped his trench coat off of the arm of the sofa and shrugged it on, taking a deep breath. “Been a long night, huh? Maybe it’ll clear my head.”

“Yeah. Maybe,” Bobby said, reserved, and Castiel waved before ducking out of the front door, tucking the coat even tighter around him even though he wasn’t all that cold.

He waited until he couldn’t see the house in the distance before pulling his cigarettes out of his pocket and lighting up, relaxing against the nicotine soothing at his busy mind, soothing at his last nerve. Castiel took a long drag and kept walking, tilting his head up so he could look at the darkening sky, smoke trickling from between his lips as he wondered if Heaven really was skywards.

No sooner did he think that than did he hear the rustle of angel wings. Castiel froze.

Anna stood in front of him. She was smiling at him sadly. “Hello, Castiel,” she greeted exhaustedly.

She looked the same, and Castiel supposed that she always would. Not a hair was out of place, and she was still wearing the same outfit, her angel blade in her hand. She looked stricter, somehow, her shoulders tight and her expression schooled. Castiel turned to look behind him, feeling the buzz of electricity on his back, and he found two suited angels there, faces clear and obviously waiting for instructions. Castiel dropped his cigarette to the road and turned back to Anna, scowling.

“What is this?” he demanded.

“Persuasion,” she said calmly.

“Persuasion,” he repeated, a sick feeling in his gut, his temper flaring under his skin. “What could you possibly have to persuade me to do now, after weeks of ignoring my calls and prayers for help? I figured I was old news, since you didn’t make a house call.”

She just looked at him. There was no emotion, no thought. Anna was cold as stone. She was Heaven’s drone, and Castiel should have known better.

She said, “Just a moment, Castiel”, and Castiel was unconscious the second one of the angels’ fingers touched his forehead.

~*~

Castiel couldn’t believe he had actually been kidnapped by angels.

It wasn’t too hard to believe once he woke up on the floor of what looked to be a nondescript warehouse, much like the one they had taken him to in order to deal with Alastair, but it was still a shock that was reverberating somewhere in his ribcage. Castiel knew the difference between a situation he could talk himself out of and one that the odds were entirely not in his favor, and this was one of the latter ones. The second he opened his eyes on the cold concrete, Castiel had a feeling that he was going to wish the angels had never set him on a pedestal as their Righteous Man.

Castiel pushed himself shakily up onto his feet. Anna, standing casually on the other side of the room, watched him.

“What the hell was that?” he demanded, rubbing at his forehead, where his face had been practically glued to the concrete. “I take it you don’t trust me anymore?”

“I don’t think we’ve ever really trusted you,” Anna enlightened him, not looking perturbed.

Castiel glanced around. There was only one easily attainable exit, and of course Anna was standing in front of it, and the door was flanked with two of her goons, two different ones than who had been with her to kidnap Castiel from South Dakota. He wondered how many henchmen she had working on this little operation, and then quickly pushed the thought from his mind. It might be easier for him just to focus on the mess in front of him and worry about what’s through the door once he gets there.

Of course, Anna, as if reading his mind, laughed. “I don’t think so, Castiel,” she said, stepping even more firmly in front of the door, smiling as if she were speaking to an adorable toddler. “You won’t make it out of this building alive, and that is a promise. You are unarmed, and we are angels. No one is looking for you here, and no one will. It’s just us.”

And damn, if that wasn’t the most terrifying thing Castiel had heard in a long time.

“This will be simple if you’re willing to listen to me and obey, Castiel,” Anna informed him, folding her hands in front of her and looking at him imploringly. He watched her, wondering if she was armed, wondering if it really mattered. “It’s one little thing.”

“An order?”

“Of sorts.” She took a step forward. Her eyes were wide, honest. Castiel distrusted her immediately. She was practically purring as she said, “In a few days’ time, I’m going to come to you and ask you to come with me, and you will follow without question.”

That was all she said before leaning backwards on her feet, raising her eyebrows in question. She made it seem so simple. Like Castiel had a choice at all.

Castiel didn’t like this. He didn’t like it at all.

“No,” he said, because he couldn’t go down without a fight.

Anna arched one eyebrow, almost in amusement. “No?” she echoed.

“Not unless you tell me what for.”

“There are only a few seals left, though I know you are already aware.” A smirk curled onto her lips as she reached up and tapped at her temple. Castiel felt a flare of rage in his chest. “In a few days, those seals will be broken. In a few days, you will either have saved us, or condemned us. And that is why I’m here.”

“Is this some kind of intervention? Your bosses sending you down here to make sure I don’t fuck up the world?”

“Oh,” Anna said flirtatiously, her grin growing like the Cheshire cat’s. “My bosses have no idea I’m here.”

Castiel’s face dropped.

Anna simpered, still smiling that smile.

“Excuse me?” Castiel finally manage to grate out.

“This isn’t exactly an order of mine,” Anna informed him, shrugging. “I was told to get you to agree to the terms and conditions, but they don’t need to know about any of the details. They don’t want to know, quite honestly. The powers that be aren’t going to care what I do, as long as we walk away with what we want.”

Castiel didn’t say anything. He felt like such a target standing there in the middle of the room, standing empty-handed in his trench coat that Dean had held to his chest to get through the nights after he was dead. He felt like such a pawn. Such a fucking idiot.

He should have known that Anna’s loyalty had always been skewed. He should have known it would always end up like this.

Heaven wouldn’t want anything to do with him unless they were going to get something out of it.

He looked at Anna and wondered what she would demand of him, ultimately. What he still had left to give.

“I won’t say yes,” he told her slowly, wishing he was more sure than he felt. She sighed like she was disappointed, but something dark covered her eyes, and he knew how low she would fall to get this.

He could tell that she thought this was her mission. She thought she had to save the world the same misguided way that Dean did. There was nothing more terrifying than one person who thought that they could shoulder the world even when it was falling in between their fingers.

“No?” she asked, pouting overdramatically. “Even if I say please?”

Castiel said nothing.

“Nothing?” she asked.

“Let’s up the ante,” she announced, tapping a finger against her chin. “You keep saying no and playing this game, I’ll zap Dean here and make you watch as I rip his throat out with my fingernails.”

“You wouldn’t do that.”

She smiled. “Wouldn’t I?”

Castiel hesitated. She smiled even wider and tipped her head, looking at him like he was an instrument she knew how to play.

“No?”

Castiel figured he would call her bluff. “No.”

“Why stop at Dean then?” she asked no one in particular, pacing the length of the room with her fluid motions for a moment before she turned back to him sharply, contemplatively. “How about we kill everyone on this god-forsaken rock that you care about? Every single one. How about I make you watch while I do it?”

Castiel didn’t respond. He kept his jaw locked.

“Tough crowd,” Anna remarked calmly, and then Castiel’s legs snapped.

He cried out and hit the ground hard, white-hot pain surging up inside of him. He felt a brief peel of glee—of finally feeling the pain that he had been craving, missing, the darkness inside of him rejoicing—before he let out a strangled yell and bit down on his lip so hard that the skin split, and he tasted blood.

Castiel let out a grunt, his hands curling into fists. Anna just watched him.

“You really don’t think Sam can do it, huh?” Castiel asked, laughing weakly. “You don’t think he can stop Lilith, so you’re going to torture me into stopping her for you?”

“It’s true that we do not believe an abomination like Sam Winchester will be able to become the monster he will have to be to beat Lilith, no,” Anna allowed, sounding almost bored. “This destiny is entirely yours, Castiel. The only question is whether you’ll be willing to accept it. Will you stand up and accept your role? You’re the only one that can stop this, Castiel, so listen to me when I ask you—will you swear to it?”

Castiel bit back another yell and groaned, “No.”

“Wow,” Anna commented dryly, straightening up. “Okay. Who do you want to start with? Jo, Ellen? Ash, Bobby, Sam? Or should we just skip straight to Dean?”

“You wouldn’t kill them,” Castiel said, but he felt terrified.

Anna bent down close to him, so that he could see the look in her eyes. Cold. Uncaring. She waited until she had stared for long enough that his expression dropped, that his terror was too much to hide, before she whispered sweetly, her breath smelling of strawberries, “Try me.”

Castiel felt cold. “You wouldn’t do that,” he insisted adamantly, but he didn’t have any hope behind the words anymore. “You—you’re an angel. You’re my ally in this war.”

Anna scoffed.

“Anna,” Castiel tried to plead, but his voice was shaking too hard—paralyzed by the pain in his legs and the terror in his lungs.

“I learned my lesson while I’ve been away, Castiel,” she told him, her tone empty. “I serve Heaven. I don’t serve man. And I certainly don’t serve you.”

And that was when Castiel knew it was all over.

She snapped her fingers and Castiel’s legs were healed. He let out an involuntary whimper and shakily got back to his feet, barely able to stay standing, but Anna didn’t seem to care how long it took him to recover. She paced around him for a minute, letting him take his time and think, letting him panic and consider every possible way that he could try to get out of this, watching him realize that he was trapped. Castiel looked back at her, observing her nervously.

“Will you swear?” she asked softly.

And Castiel, hands shaking, knees weak, whispered, “No.”

She snapped her fingers again and Castiel braced himself, ready for the pain, but there was nothing. He glanced around, as if expecting the roof to start raining down, but nothing happened. Anna still stood there with her hand in post-snapping position, her eyes cold and unwavering on his.

“Oops,” she said, and he went cold. “The Roadhouse is burning to the ground. There’re a lot of people in there. Hope everyone makes it out.”

“You can’t do that!” he yelled, panicking. She smiled.

“I just did,” she purred, and then raised her eyebrows. “One more no, Castiel, and I’ll burn the Singer house down to the ground. I’ll let Bobby Singer die and I’ll drag Dean back here kicking and screaming, and I’m going to make you watch as I torture him the same way you were on the Rack. Piece by piece, Castiel, I’ll keep him alive, and bleeding, and screaming. And then, right before he dies, I’ll heal him. And then we’ll go again, until you say yes.”

Castiel felt tears stinging in his eyes, panic screaming in his chest. He thought he was going to have a breakdown. He knew she wasn’t bluffing when she said the Roadhouse was burning, knew that they were past bluffing each other at this point. And he was scared, because he didn’t know which of his friends were inside, and if they would make it out. He thought of Ellen, and Ash—and, in a way, he was thankful that Jo had taken off to hunt with other young hunters, because at least she wasn’t there, at least he hadn’t condemned her to burn. But what about the other innocent people, the other clueless hunters, who wouldn’t know that the reason the roof just caught flame and came crashing down around them, trapping them, was because Castiel was scared, he was terrified, and he didn’t want to survive the apocalypse only to have the angels ruin him right after—

Castiel took in a shaky breath, and barely managed to cling to it.

Anna just stood there. Watching. Waiting.

Castiel whimpered, begged, “Please don’t hurt Dean.”

“I will not hurt him,” she replied, “if you swear to Heaven. But if you say no again, I will destroy him.”

“Okay,” Castiel stammered, and his voice broke. He swallowed hard, shaking so hard he almost had to sink to the ground, and said, “Okay, yes, I swear. I swear, please.”

Anna’s smirk was self-satisfied, pleased. She came to stand so close to Castiel that he could feel her breathing, could practically feel the smugness coming off of her in waves. He didn’t care. He just had to get out of there, had to find out how many friends he killed. He could barely breathe just thinking about it, could barely keep the tears from falling.

“Do you give yourself over wholly to the services of God and His angels?” Anna whispered. Castiel couldn’t look at her.

“Yes,” he said through his teeth.

“Do you swear to follow His will and His word swiftly and obediently?”

“I swear,” Castiel choked out, and he knew it was over, felt it in the coldness of his bones, but he couldn’t stop himself from demanding, “Now what?”

“Now,” Anna said, smiling, “you come when we call. And you do whatever we tell you to do.”

Castiel swallowed hard, not liking the sound of that. Anna laughed lightly, shaking her head and stepping back.

“But, for now,” she added, “you’re no use to us.”

She snapped her fingers, and Castiel was suddenly back in the same spot where he had been taken, so far away from Bobby’s. Now, it was cold outside, and he couldn’t stop shaking, something like shock settling into him, and Castiel let the tears flow as he sunk to the ground, unable to hold himself up, not needing to compose himself because he knew no one was going to come look for him, knowing that he was worth even less now than he had been. He had practically signed his soul away to Heaven, the same thing he did to Hell with a little different of an outer appearance, and he didn’t know what was going to happen because of it. He had no idea what the angels would make him do. He didn’t want to know, because he couldn’t stop thinking about what they had already done, and he almost didn’t want to return to his life and know how much he had ruined it.

Eventually, Castiel would have to wipe his tears and stand with squared shoulders and walk into the Singer house pretending like he didn’t know a thing about the building that’s just burned down in Nebraska. He would have to stand up and face what he had done and the consequences of what he would have to do. But, for now, he was just willing to sit there, falling apart in on himself, and dreading when the sun would rise, and he would have to repair the pieces.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is late. That's a long story.
> 
> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> x Slang


	26. Bad Blood

Dean surprised him.

Not long after Castiel walked through the door from his confrontation with Anna, after having sat on the ground to collect himself for about an hour before he could even convince himself to go back to the Singer house, Dean had walked forward and taken his hand, tugging him straight back out the backdoor. They didn’t stop until they were rounding one of the platforms of cars, out of the eye of the house and the barn both, and even then Dean didn’t say anything—he just threw his arms around Castiel, squeezing him tight, shaking.

Castiel blinked, taken aback. And then he moved slowly, as if he didn’t want to startle a wounded animal, to wind his arms around Dean’s waist, pulling him as close as he possibly could with all of the limited space Dean had left in between their bodies.

“I’m sorry,” Dean murmured, and Castiel was thrown through an even bigger loop.

“For what?” Castiel replied just as softly, whispering into his shoulder. “You didn’t do anything.”

“I shouldn’t have been a dick to you in the car, and I shouldn’t have pushed Sam away like I did. I just—I’m fucking terrified. I’m afraid of my brother and you and this fucking apocalypse, and I don’t know what to do.”

“Dean,” Castiel whispered, pulling back just far enough that he could rest his forehead on Dean’s. Dean took a deep breath, closing his eyes and making an effort to relax into the touch. He reached up and touched his jaw, almost hesitantly, but then Dean turned his face into the touch, and Castiel found the courage to coast his fingers up and down the stubble on his jaw. “Dean, why would you be afraid of me?”

“I’m not blind, man,” Dean replied, the skin around his eyes straining. “I don’t like the way you’ve been looking at me lately. Like you’re saying goodbye or some shit.”

Castiel didn’t say anything.

“I’m not good with talking about how I feel,” Dean said as if this should shock Castiel, and Castiel just barely managed to catch his laugh, but not enough, because Dean cracked his eyes open and gave him a scolding, amused look. “Seriously. I know I suck. But I do care, and I do notice, and you haven’t been you lately, man. You scared the shit out of me back there. For a second, I thought you were actually going to shoot him.”

Dean couldn’t even say Sam’s name. It would have been a painful discovery if the rest of Dean’s words weren’t sinking in like a paralyzing poison under Castiel’s skin. He looked away, hating himself for how much he had changed in the last few months, hating how he couldn’t be that constant Dean had had in his life before Sam had died.

“I’m scared, too,” Castiel admitted softly, shakily. His hands curled into the back of Dean’s jacket, but he couldn’t say anything else that hadn’t already been said wordlessly. He buried his face in Dean’s leather jacket and let Dean’s hands rub up and down his back soothingly, possessively. Dean turned his head to press a kiss into Castiel’s temple, and he held on even tighter.

“I know, baby,” Dean murmured. “It’s okay, it’s alright. We’re gonna figure it out, okay? Just like we always have. I love you.”

Castiel had so much to lose. He had so many regrets already.

He couldn’t choke back the tears anymore, so he let them fall, knowing Dean wouldn’t ask but knowing he would care enough to wipe them away, to try to make everything better, and Castiel wished so many things had been different, and that so many things would end up staying the same.

Castiel just clung to Dean, and hoped.

~*~

Hours and hours later, the three of them were still sitting around the living room, restless, knowing they had hours at best. Castiel felt like he was being clawed apart, like he was the prey for hellhounds again. Every once in a while he would look up and see Dean looking at him, and they would smile at each other and he would feel a little bit better, knowing that he at least still had this, knowing that at least Dean still loved him.

They didn’t hear a car approaching, but the pounding on the door was loud and sudden, making Castiel jump. Dean unconsciously grabbed for the nearest weapon, his eyes shooting up to look at the door. Bobby was locked down, quiet, trying to listen to anything that could be useful, but they couldn’t hear anything through the walls of the house. Castiel met Dean’s eyes and stood slowly, reaching behind him to pull out one of his knives, crossing to the other side of the room slowly. Dean hovered behind him, a little noisier but hanging back. Castiel got to the door, Dean slipping just out of sight, and readied the blade to attack, just in case.

He threw the door open, and Ellen stared up at him. The moment their eyes locked, she let out a choked sob.

“Ellen?” Castiel demanded, feeling relief that he couldn’t show, and he didn’t have a moment before she was jumping at him, grabbing him up in a tight hug and clinging to him as tight as she possibly could. He slowly brought his arms around her, glancing over his shoulder at Dean, who was looking at him in shock—of course, because Bobby and Dean had no idea about the Roadhouse, and Castiel wasn’t supposed to know either. Castiel sent him a baffled expression, pulling Ellen back far enough that he could close and lock the door, rubbing her back.

“It’s okay,” Castiel told her, but he felt like he was going to be sick. He glanced at Dean, and he looked strained, worried, because it was something uneasy to see a woman as strong as Ellen break down. “Ellen, what’s wrong? What’s happened?”

“The Roadhouse burned to the ground,” she grated out, pulling away finally, wiping her eyes hard. She sniffed and looked around at them, her eyes red and swollen, but her expression showing just how tough she was, willing to pick up the pieces and keep going, no matter how much she wanted to break apart again. Castiel admired her strength. “There were—a lotta hunters died in there. Ash did, too.”

“Jesus,” Dean muttered.

“What set it?” Bobby demanded, reaching out and gesturing for Ellen to follow him. Castiel fell into step with Dean, but neither of them said anything, just exchanged a look of grave intensity.

Ellen shook her head. “No idea,” she told them, sitting down at the table. Bobby held up a flask and poured a shot before sliding it over the tabletop to her. She caught it instinctually, glancing down at it, before looking up at Bobby with a _don’t fuck with me, Singer_ expression. “Holy water, Bobby?”

“Gotta be sure,” Bobby explained, and Ellen held his eye as she swallowed it without a problem. She set the glass back on the table and slid it back to Bobby.

“Whiskey now, if you don’t mind,” she told him, sinking into the back of the chair. Bobby poured the shot mechanically, all of them keeping their eyes on her. Castiel could feel Dean’s tension in his shoulders, just an inch away from his. Castiel just couldn’t stop looking at her.

“How’d you get out?” Castiel asked carefully.

“I wasn’t supposed to. I was supposed to be in there with everyone else. But we ran out of pretzels, of all things. It was just dumb luck.” Ellen looked uncharacteristically miserable when Bobby handed her the new shot, and she took it without a beat, exhaling sharply while setting the shot glass back on the table. “Just pulled back in and everything was ass-up. Tried to see if I could get in and get somebody out, but it was too late. Roof was collapsed. Just called the police and didn’t bother to stick around to see what happened next.”

“Any idea who would’ve done it?” Dean questioned.

“Not really,” she said as Castiel felt a new wave of nausea and guilt, throwing up the best poker face that he could. “Nothing or nobody comes to mind.”

“Hear anything on angel radio about this?” Dean asked Castiel, turning to look at him, and it felt like Castiel was choking down battery acid when he framed the word, “No.”

Ellen casted a confused look to Bobby, who informed her, “Angels installed holy radio in Cas’s skull somehow. He can hear ’em now.”

“Some of the time,” Castiel admitted, reaching up and rubbing at one of his temples.

“Where’s Sam?” Ellen must have immediately felt the shift in the atmosphere the same as Castiel did, because her eyebrows soared upwards. “What’s up?”

“Sam’s out of commission,” Dean told her, eyes dark. “At least for our team.”

She looked like she wanted to ask, but Ellen wasn’t stupid in any way, shape, or form—she knew that now wasn’t the time, so she just nodded and sat back, sending Castiel a worried look. He didn’t respond with one of his own, instead just flickered his gaze back and forth between Dean and Bobby, wondering when the explosion would come—because it was going to happen, there was no doubt to that—and wondering how much time he could possibly have to take a deep breath, knowing way too well the sick feeling of being able to count the number of hours he will probably be alive on his fingers and toes. Castiel stared determinedly down at the table before letting his eyes close, the darkness a suitable distraction for only a few moments before the hum of angel radio in the back of his head was too much to focus on alone, and he opened his eyes again.

“You’ve had a long day,” Castiel heard himself say to Ellen, and Dean and Bobby stopped talking. “Maybe you should go get some rest, that might be good for you. You must be exhausted.”

“No argument there,” Ellen said, trying to grin, but there was no hiding the bags under her eyes or the paleness of her cheeks, so Castiel just gestured for her to stand and walked with her to the stairs, casting on look over his shoulder, but it was to find Bobby and Dean watching him go, frowns on their faces. He turned back around, as if pretending not to notice, and kept walking.

Ellen humored him until they got to the top floor, until he had ushered her into the guest room he had been using on the few occasions he had been able to sleep at all in the last few days, and she barely wasted a second before whirling around to look at him, her eyes on fire.

“What have you done, Castiel?” she ground out almost violently, her face turning red and her hands curling into fists at her side. Castiel felt a brief flash of panic, wondering how the hell she would have known that he had inadvertently started the Roadhouse fire, but his panic dissipated when she continued, “You look like you did when you crawled out of the earth, so don’t try to tell me something isn’t wrong right now.”

“It’s just a lot,” Castiel confessed, practically staggering with relief and trying not to show it. “This whole Righteous Man bullshit is just too much. I don’t trust the angels.”

“Mhm,” Ellen replied, unconvinced.

“What?”

“I think you know what.” She crossed her arms over her chest, watching him with an intensity that almost made him so anxious that he had to look away. “You can tell me, but you don’t have to. I think we both already know.”

Castiel stood there with her in a silence for a long moment, just looking at her while she looked at him. And then he whispered, “I’m going to die.”

Ellen’s face didn’t change, didn’t crumple in sadness or harden in fear, and he felt his knees shaking as he choked on his words, continued on to say, “This is going to kill me. I can’t make it past this apocalypse. It’s not designed to let me live. And I don’t—Ellen, I don’t want to die. I’m finally happy and I don’t want to die, I don’t want to go to Hell again, I don’t want to go to Heaven, I don’t want to die.”

His voice broke. Ellen took two steps forward and threw her arms around him.

He raised shaking hands up to touch her back, the closest thing to a mother he’s ever had since he was little, and his voice was shaking, barely louder than a whisper, as he murmured again and again about how he was going to die and how much he didn’t want to, how he was scared and he didn’t like not knowing, how he didn’t want to have to walk into this and leave them all again, that he wanted to live. And she just held him there, grounding him the way a mother would as he fell apart against her, terrified of his own shadow and his own destiny and his own promise. She just stood there and held him for a long time, until he regained control of his breathing and could stand without his knees knocking together. She pulled back and held his shoulders, looking him right in the eyes, her lips pressed together tightly as she tried to keep it together.

“Ash found something for you,” she confessed suddenly, almost as if she wasn’t sure if she should be saying it, but continued when Castiel didn’t break down. “He called me, right after I left. Said he found something, that I had to get back as soon as possible. I must’ve only been five minutes.”

“What did he find?” Castiel asked, thinking about how he had asked Ash to look into the true meaning of the Righteous Man whenever he had the time, and his whole body went cold.

Maybe there was a reason other than getting Castiel’s permission for Anna having burnt the Roadhouse down. Maybe that was nothing other than great timing. Another one of Anna’s magic tricks.

“I don’t know,” Ellen told him, shaking her head. “He wouldn’t say over the phone. Just told me to come quick.”

“Was there anything in the safe?”

“Nothing. It must’ve burned with him.”

Castiel muttered a swear under his breath and looked away.

“Why? Was he looking for something?”

“Not necessarily,” Castiel replied. “But I think he found something anyway.”

She looked like she wanted to ask but, about this, Castiel couldn’t let her. He wasn’t about to let anyone else get hurt for this, was beyond playing into the angels’ mind game.

“You should get some sleep,” he told her before she could say a word, nodding to the bed. “You must be exhausted.”

She paused, pursing her lips at him, before she nodded, turning around to kick her shoes off. Castiel nodded back, even though she couldn’t see him, and turned to go.

“Don’t let it happen,” she said, and he stopped in the doorway, turning back. She’d only shrugged out of her jacket, which she was still holding in her hands, curling her fingers tightly into the fabric. “If you think you’re gonna die, then don’t. Fight like hell. It’s not too late. You still have plenty of time.”

Castiel shook his head, and then said, “No. I don’t.”

He closed the door behind him.

~*~

He had no idea why he thought this was a good idea. He didn’t know who would be listening—Anna, probably, or one of her henchmen, would be watching over him and making sure he didn’t do something stupid before he was needed. Still, there he sat, his hands folded together on his lap on the back porch of Bobby’s home, anxiety clawing wounds into his stomach.

He looked down at his hands. The open, darkening sky felt too ominous now. Like, if he looked long and hard enough, something else would be looking back.

And he wanted to pray. It might be because it was just so conditioned of him, he wasn’t sure, but he wanted to pray like he wanted his heart to keep beating, and he needed the faith that he’d had for many years to help him get through, and he was tired. He was so tired, and he figured it would be about time for some higher power, if God was still hanging around and letting his children just run wild, to finally acknowledge him and maybe take a good listen to what he had to say.

For a while, though, Castiel didn’t know what to say. He just sat there and stared at his hands, not knowing what he wanted to feel or what he wanted to be.

And then he did. He wanted to be angry.

“How could you let this happen?” he asked no one in particular, feeling the hot bubble of familiar rage building in his chest. “All of this—how _could_ you? You’re letting the angels run loose, and for what? Just to destroy a planet that you don’t give a _fuck_ about anymore? How are _you_ God? How are you any more righteous than any one of us?”

Castiel reached up and ran both of his hands through his hair to keep from punching something.

“I finally have him,” Castiel grounded out through his teeth, his chest feeling too tight. “I finally have Dean like I have always wanted and like I have always prayed for and, now, you’re just going to take him away? I’m supposed to be one of your wind-up warriors that you can set on the ground and I’ll walk toward the fight, but I don’t even get a reward? I get a few months of being terrified of my own shadow and a few stolen moments in the fucking backseat of a car? I deserve more than that. After everything you’ve done. After everything _you’ve_ put me through. I deserve to _live_.”

He didn’t know why he paused, why he stopped as if waiting for something or someone to answer him. He knew there would be nothing; even if there was something, it would have been an angel, and he didn’t want to talk to any of them today. If today was going to be one of his last days, he didn’t want that. He didn’t even want this. But he knew from the last time he had a handful of days left that it’s never the peace and quiet that one would want.

It’s frenzied and panicked and sad and it’s filled with denial and broken promises and false hope.

Castiel hoped that, if he lived through this and lived through the inevitable rest of his life hunting, that he would die in his sleep. That he would go peacefully, and he wouldn’t have to face the crushing despair of having to say goodbye.

“I never asked for this,” Castiel whispered. “I just wanted everyone else to be happy. I—I just want to be happy. Is that too much to ask for?”

No response.

“Now that I have seen your will, I don’t know how I ever believed in you.”

No response.

“This is wrong. You’re letting people die just because someone wrote it down once.”

No response.

“If I die—” Castiel’s voice broke. He shook it off, looked back at the sky. “If I die, they better live. Or I swear to God, I will claw my way out of wherever you put me and I will destroy each and every one of you.”

No response.

“I don’t want this. I don’t deserve this. And I don’t want to die.”

No response.

“I don’t even think I believe in you anymore.”

No response.

Castiel sat outside for another twenty minutes. And then, he went back inside, and the world continued to end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> xo Slang


	27. In My Time of Dying

“Two,” Castiel murmured, closing his eyes. “Two seals left, and one is about to fall.”

“Shit,” Dean whispered back, rubbing his face. “What should we do?”

“Nothin’ we can do,” Ellen replied. “This is way bigger than us.”

“There has to be something,” Dean argued, looking around at where they were all sitting around the kitchen table, three souls who had seen enough and almost just wanted to die already. “Who do we know that would know and isn’t Anna?”

Castiel shook his head. Dean’s face fell, and he hung his head to stare at the tabletop instead of at one of them. Castiel understood.

There was silence for a handful of seconds. And then Bobby grunted, “How ‘bout that writer?”

Castiel’s head snapped up. Dean was already grabbing for his keys.

“Chuck,” Castiel said, not moving but feeling a new energized buzz by his heart. “Do you really think he’ll know something?”

“He’s the best bet we’ve got,” Dean replied, grabbing for his jacket on the living room sofa. He paused when he saw Castiel still hadn’t moved, and he turned around to look at all of them. “We have to do _something_. Bobby can’t get ahold of Sam and the world’s two seals away from Armageddon. I’m not about to sit here with stewing in my own juices and feeling sorry for myself, so you can either come with me, or you can wait here.”

Ellen looked at Bobby. Bobby frowned at Dean. Castiel looked between them all for a moment before he pushed himself to his feet, pulling his jacket off the back of the chair.

“It’s the only lead we’ve got,” he agreed, looking at Ellen and Bobby. “You guys can wait here, man the phones and watch the news and try to get in contact with Sam and Jo. But I can’t just sit here. There has to be something we can do and, if anyone is gonna know it, it might be Chuck. And, if he doesn’t, then maybe he knows something else.”

It was obvious that Bobby thought differently, thought it was hopeless to let them have hope, but he nodded still, creaking to his feet. “Ellen and I’ll stay. You two go. Lemme know if you find anything.”

“Cas?” Dean asked, already at the door. Castiel paused, glancing back around.

Ellen was staring at him. He met her eyes, and immediately looked away.

“Let’s go,” Castiel said, and he didn’t let himself look back.

~*~

Castiel knew how to pick his battles, especially when it came to Dean Winchester. But, really, the lines were starting to blur. He didn’t want to leave anything unsaid, even if it meant that they would be fighting whenever it all went to hell in a hand basket—Castiel didn’t know why. Maybe he just wanted to feel something. Maybe he could delude himself into thinking that it would make him not feel like he’s drowning. Like the world is on mute.

No matter the reasoning behind it, two hours into the drive, Castiel broached the topic that he shouldn’t have been going near with a ten-foot pole.

“You should call Sam.”

Dean’s head snapped toward him, eyes wide, but then he turned back to the road with muffled cursing as he slammed his foot down on the brake. Castiel waited patiently for the adrenaline to wear away before Dean answered, his voice huskier than usual, “I’m not calling him.”

“He’s your brother.”

“We are damn near kickoff for Armageddon, Cas. Don’t you think we got bigger fish to fry?”

It was the wrong battle to pick. Castiel didn’t care.

“I know you’re pissed, and I know Sam hasn’t done the right thing or acted in the right ways, but he’s your—”

Castiel paused. Dean let out a sardonic laugh.

“Blood?” Dean supplied for him, voice dripping with acid meant to burn, and it did. “He’s my blood, is that what you were gonna say?”

“He’s your brother,” Castiel said instead. “And he’s drowning.”

“I tried to help him, and look what happened.”

“Maybe you need to try again.”

“It’s too late.”

Castiel looked at Dean, looked at the way his shoulder stiffened. “You know it’s not too late.”

“It is for this,” Dean insisted, but Castiel knew that every instinct of Dean’s, under the frayed hurt, was screaming to know if his little brother was safe. He knew Dean would never be able to cast Sam away, because caring for Sam was Dean’s default setting. Castiel knew it must be eating Dean alive to be keeping Sam away, no matter what Sam had done, because that was his brother. That was the one person he would die over and over again to protect. And they both knew it.

So Castiel said, “Bullshit.”

“I told him not to walk out that door,” Dean responded, voice dark, “and he did. Just like he did with Stanford. Sam never wanted to be part of this family, and he showed me that again. He _wants_ to walk away, the same that he always has, and I’m sick and tired of chasing after him, Cas, not if he doesn’t want to be here. I can’t keep doing this. It’s like déjà vu and I can’t keep going through the same damn thing. If Sam wants this, if he could keep choosing this shit over his family, then screw him. He can do what he wants.”

“If Sam needs anything right now,” Castiel murmured, staring at Dean measuredly, “he needs his brother.”

Dean opened his mouth to shoot him down, but Castiel didn’t give him the chance to let him interrupt.

“Sam has always lived his life with the knowledge that you’re going to be there to catch him when he falls, and _this_ is the time you choose to push him away? To call him a monster? He’s gotta be lost right now, Dean. He’s running scared, and he’s going to do what he thinks is right even if it means he dies trying because he has no one to tell him that they don’t _want_ him to do that. You’re the only one that can get through to him, Dean. You two are the most stubborn people I have ever met, and you bump heads constantly and can never seem to agree on anything, but you two would do anything for each other. If you called him now, after that fight you had, that might restore some of his faith. That might make him come back. And I know that’s what you want. We’re about to fight a battle here, and you want your brother by your side. So call him and have him there.”

Dean drove in silence for what seemed like a long, long time. Castiel was starting to think that Dean wasn’t even going to bother to answer when he took a deep breath, not taking his eyes off the road, and announced, “Sam made his choice.”

Castiel closed his eyes. “Yeah,” he replied softly. “Sounds like you have, too.”

~*~

“I love you,” Castiel said somewhere around the Indiana border, firmly looking out the window and not at Dean. He didn’t know what his reaction was, and he didn’t really care. He was tired, and his head hurt, and Castiel just wanted it all to be over. “That will never change, Dean.”

After a moment, Dean replied, sounding tired, “Yeah. I know.”

Castiel figured that was as good as he was going to get, and he allowed them to lull back into that same restless silence of unasked questions and unsaid things.

~*~

Chuck isn’t surprised to see them. Castiel doesn’t see that as a good sign.

“I was gonna call, but you were on your way, and this is how it’s supposed to happen, I think,” Chuck explained nervously, pacing anxiously in the living room in front of his desk, where the computer was showing a full Word document of a new piece of gospel. Dean was hovering just inside of the room, practically humming with all of the energy and grief locked inside of him. Castiel stood next to him, not really looking at him, his arms crossed over his chest. He was watching Chuck, mostly. Every once in a while, for some reason, his eyes kept darting around the room. He felt restless. Like they were under attack.

“Chuck,” Castiel said, watching the prophet carefully. “Where is Sam?”

“Leaving to kill Lilith,” Chuck told them, looking despaired. “Don’t try to call him, he—the angels are jamming his phones. Probably yours, too. Guys, I swear I didn’t know this, I swear I would have told you if I knew, but Lilith—you can’t let Sam kill her.”

Dean glanced at Castiel, and then seemed to remember that they were at a weird middle ground, because he sharply looked away. “Why not?”

“Because killing Lilith is the last seal,” Chuck blurted out, and then relaxed like he was unburdened with the weight of the world. In a way, he was.

Castiel and Dean realized what that meant at the same time—Castiel tensed. Dean looked like he had been struck with lightning. Chuck just watched them nervously, because he knew what came next and he obviously didn’t like it. That alone made Castiel uneasy.

The angels in his head were so loud he thought his head would burst. Castiel leaned up and pressed the heel of his hand against his temple, as if hoping to press it back, but it did nothing to alleviate the pounding.

“Where?” Castiel grated out.

“Ilchester, Maryland,” Chuck replied quickly. “St. Mary’s Convent. Sam is on his way, but it’s going to take him a bit, so you might still have a chance to stop him.”

“A convent?” Dean demanded, sounding truly taken aback. “Lucifer is gonna rise at a _convent_?”

“It’s really fucked up,” Chuck agreed, and then turned to take a long swig of whiskey.

“We have to go now,” Dean said, turning to Castiel, eyes wide but determination sinking in, and he looked so much like the Dean that Castiel had first met, that Castiel had immediately fallen like a sack of bricks for, that he wanted so badly to smile but it hurt a little too much.

But something was bursting in his head, and Castiel could barely breathe but somehow he understood what was happening, and he only barely managed to gain control of his head by the time he gasped out, “Incoming.”

Dean spun, as if looking for a seeable threat, but Castiel felt it coming like a freight train roaring through an empty station. Chuck’s computer screen suddenly started flickering wildly only a handful of seconds before the ground started to shake, the whole structure around them, and Castiel reached out and grabbed a handful of Dean’s jacket to keep himself upright, turning his panicked eyes onto him and seeing a reflection in Dean’s. A vase smashed to the floor. Chuck just stood in the middle of it, not panicking but instead looking dismayed and like he had been run over thirty thousand times by a sixteen-wheeler.

“Aw, man, not again,” Chuck groaned, turning to the kitchen windows. “No, no, no!”

The blinding white light started to build at the windows, the same way that it had in the motel room—and, same as it had that time, Castiel started to hear that warlike chorus of angels, the ones screaming for righteous justice and holy wrath, and Castiel turned to Dean with wide eyes. They were the intruders here. They were the enemies standing by the prophet, endangering him. They were the ones the angels were coming for.

Dean seemed to realize this at the same time Castiel did. It all showed in the horror in his eyes when Castiel used his handhold on Dean’s jacket to push him toward the front door and scream over the noise, “ _Go_.”

Dean paled, horrified. He opened his mouth and yelled something back, but the windows started shattering and Castiel lost track of the sound somewhere through it. Dean stumbled toward him, grabbing for him again, but Castiel knew. He grabbed Dean’s face, looking him right in the eye before planting their lips together, savoring the feeling and knowing that this would be the last time, before pulling away, pushing Dean away, tears already burning at his eyes as Castiel screamed, “It’s the archangel! _Go_! Get to Sam!”

Still, Dean didn’t go anywhere. He just shook his head, eyes frenzied, knowing what was happening. But the noise was getting louder, and the angels’ chanting sounded more like shrieking, and Chuck was clinging to a desk with his eyes shut and Dean was standing there like he didn’t know if he wanted to run toward his brother or to run away from Castiel, and Castiel felt his tears overflow from his eyes, felt his voice break when he pleaded with Dean, practically begged him, “I’ll hold them off, I’ll hold them all off!”

“Cas,” Dean must have said, but Castiel couldn’t hear his voice over the screaming angels. The light was becoming too much to bear, and he could barely see him anymore. But, still, Castiel heard himself beg for one more thing, one more miracle, and that miracle passed through his lips in the same manifestation that they always did:

“ _Dean._ ”

And then Dean was gone, and Castiel was standing with Chuck looking down the barrel of a pissed off archangel, and Castiel knew this was it. He was burning, he was going to be smote; he was going to die here. Chuck reached out and gripped his arm tight before letting it go.

And then it all stopped, so suddenly it nearly knocked Castiel off his feet. He stumbled, dazed, disoriented, and looked up to Chuck.

Chuck said, so defeated, “Behind you.”

Castiel barely managed to see a flash of red before the world was tumbling off of its axis, blurring at the edges, and he was gone.

~*~

The world was too bright when he tried to wake up. It reminded him of something, some memory that was just out of his grasp when he tried to reach for it—brightness and confusion and a laugh in a voice that sounded almost familiar. Castiel wasn’t sure, didn’t understand. His head didn’t hurt, for the first time in a week it actually _didn’t hurt_ , and that disoriented him more than it would have if it did. Castiel pushed into awareness, pushed for his brain to stay awake, and he forced himself to keep opening his eyes, to keep blinking in an attempt to focus on the room around him, but it was—difficult. The walls were all painted white, and it was bright. It felt like a padded cell and a hospital room combined. Castiel tried to move his hands.

His eyes sprang open, new desperation sinking in.

He was tied down.

“Sorry,” a voice that didn’t sound sorry at all said from his left, and he knew that voice. He turned his head, still feeling like he was at the bottom of a pile of bricks, to find Anna standing beside him, her hands curled in front of her as she stared down at him, watching him come back into her own skin. She looked almost curious. Like he was something under a microscope. “The easiest way to get you here was to knock you out, since the transition isn’t always kind. Not many humans are meant to be up here before their expiration date, but . . . well. You’re different, as is already established.”

“Wait, where am I?” Castiel demanded, his voice practically a croak, glancing around. White walls, black table. Castiel was tied to a chair, one of the ones like the dentists’ where one of his foster families took him to have a tooth pulled out when he was seven. He tugged at his restraints, but there was no give. He would be bruised to fuck in the morning.

He glanced down at himself, checking for injuries, and was immediately thrown through a loop to find that he wasn’t in the clothes he had been wearing. Instead, he was donned in his typical FBI outfit, suit and tie and trench coat and all. Castiel looked up at Anna questioningly, and she smiled at him.

“We have a dress code, Castiel,” she told him, sounding like she was trying not to laugh. “It’s about time you started abiding to it.”

“Where are we?” he demanded again, fear flooding into his veins. He didn’t like this. Something was so, so wrong, and he thought he knew what it was, but he was terrified of being right. “Anna, what the fuck is going on?”

“You know where we are,” she told him patiently, still smiling pleasantly, looking so brainwashed that he almost started to scream, but he knew no one would hear him. Even if they did, they would not help him. Anna glided forward half of a step, leaning forward on her toes, and raised her eyebrows, urging him to come to the conclusion all on his own.

Castiel was thankful that at least the tight binds on his hands kept them from shaking too hard. “Heaven,” he replied hoarsely, voice shaking. “We’re in Heaven.”

She smiled wider. She looked pleased.

“Yes,” she said, raising her hands up as if to show off the grandeur. “We needed a secure, sterile place for this, and home was the only place that made sense. No one unsavory will be able to interrupt us here. Honestly, no one holy will, either—half of my bosses don’t even know what I’m doing.”

“Anna,” Castiel said, slowly, like he didn’t understand, because he didn’t want to. “Anna, what are you talking about?”

“You gave us permission, Castiel,” she informed him patiently, calmly, like a teacher explaining the simplest of concepts. “You said yes. So, I am here to collect. You are here to begin your services to Heaven.”

Castiel wasn’t sure what that meant but still some instinct inside of him had him pulling frantically at his restraints, trying to break through them as if his strength would ever be enough here, and he met Anna’s eyes and saw how calm and peaceful hers were and thought about psychopaths, sociopaths. It only made him tug harder.

“What services are you talking about?” he asked. “What are you going to make me do?”

“You’re the Righteous Man,” she pointed out again, crossing the room so that she could lean softly against the edge of the table. There was something sitting on the surface, but Castiel couldn’t see it clearly. His stomach churned, horrified. Every nerve in his body screamed for him to run, but he was trapped. Cornered. Like a moth pinned to a wall.

Anna slowly pulled an angel blade from inside of her coat, weighing it in her hands. Somehow, Castiel knew it was his, the one he had carried since Uriel’s death, though he didn’t know how—it wasn’t like any of the blades had any markings to set them apart. But watching her examine the blade, he knew it was his like he knew that his left hand was his left hand. He felt nervous to see her wielding it, to see her looking at it like that. She caught his gaze and lifted her head up, lips twisting into a grin.

“You’re going to need this,” she told him, and then crossed the room to carefully slide it into the folds of his trench coat. Castiel stared at her, torn between fear and horror, but she didn’t say anything else about it, not seeming concerned at just having armed him with the one weapon in the world that could kill her. She patted the front of his jacket, over the blade, before she turned away. She moved until she was back at the table, looking down at it.

Castiel tugged more at the restraints. Nothing. He was losing hope, fast, and he felt it in the rapid beat of his heart, at the breath that pumped in and out of his lungs too fast. He wondered how long he had been out, if Dean was alright. If Dean found Sam. If the apocalypse was beginning.

“None of the books on Earth got it right, I’m afraid,” Anna announced from her table, turning slowly back to face him, smiling when he was sure his confusion at the new subject crossed his face. “The stories about the Righteous Man, I mean. There are so many translations, so much guesswork. I’ll give you humans this—when all else failed, you had your creativity. Imaginations make the world brighter and whatnot. There are some interesting theories floating around, but none of it is close to the real deal. None of it truly understands what it means. I don’t think even you do.”

Anna sighed heavily, shaking her head. Castiel just watched her, choking on his fear.

“Some things that you know are true,” she informed him, shrugging. “You are the only one who could start this apocalypse, and the only one that can end it. What you didn’t know was that it was never really your choice, Castiel. It was ours. And we’ve decided that it’s time for the world to burn.”

Castiel’s skin felt too tight, too cold. “What are you talking about?” he demanded, so aware that one of the only things he had said through the entirety were questions she was avoiding answering, questions that should have been easy for him to guess. But still, like his higher cognitive abilities were shut off, like denial was enough, he couldn’t understand. He was looking at Anna and he didn’t understand the gleam in her eye.

“Oh, Castiel,” she said, and laughed. “This has never been a battle for you to fight—it’s been smoke and mirrors, a facsimile of reality. We’ve been controlling it in its entirety, fighting only to buy ourselves more time. We had to prepare you, of course, to make sure you would be able to survive this war. In the end, you will be the one to decide it all, really. You’re the one that will hold the universe in your hands and decide what side to choose, as if there has ever been a choice. Your illusion of free will has been—amusing. You humans all get such a kick at believing you can play God.”

“This whole time that you were fighting for the seals, you were just trying to prepare me for your end of days?” Castiel demanded, almost rhetorically, because he didn’t need to hear an answer to tell him what he already knew had to be true. He shook his head slowly, unable to believe his own naivety. “The angels have wanted Lucifer out of the cage this entire time.”

“That’s been our orders,” she told him like a soldier, standing proud.

Castiel wanted to be sick.

“But that’s not all, of course,” she allowed, smiling again. “This part is the important part, Castiel, so make sure you understand me when I say—it’s always been you. You and Sam and Dean are the three that are going to decide it all. It’s the way it’s always been written. But, to do this, to guarantee our endgame, we needed one small thing, one thing that’s going to turn out to be the most important.” She pointed out him, downright beaming now. “We needed your permission.”

And Castiel suddenly understood.

“Your vessels need to give consent,” Castiel whispered through frozen, horrified lips. Anna nodded, seemingly glad that he was catching on.

“We’re not demons,” she scorned, casting him an earnest look. “And before you try to argue the terms—it’s not that easy. It doesn’t matter what happens to make you say it. You swore yourself to Heaven, took the oath, and now—now, Castiel, it’s time for you to face your destiny.”

She held up a vial of swirling white and whispered, “It’s time for you to rise.”

“You can’t do this,” he told her, uselessly, because she just laughed him off.

“You gave us permission. You swore to do whatever you had to do in order to serve Heaven. This is it, Castiel. For the second time, you have sold your soul. Congratulations.”

The restraints couldn’t even stop his shaking now. Castiel’s chest shook with the rise and fall as he stared at the glowing vial in Anna’s hand.

“Whose grace is that?” he whispered.

“Back when Lucifer rebelled, when Michael casted him out of Heaven and into the cage, he took a memento,” Anna informed him, and Castiel almost started screaming right then and there. She tapped the vial with a fingernail. “This is only a small piece of Lucifer’s grace, but it was an archangels’, it was one of the best angels’, and it’s more than my grace or Uriel’s or any of ours. With this, you’ll be invincible. You’ll move mountains. When you speak, the earth will quake. You will be the most feared on the planet, Castiel. You will be the one to win us this war.”

Anna pulled out her angel blade, still looking at him. She took a deep breath, and hooked her lips up into another grin. Castiel felt like he was stuck in the nightmare where it’s impossible to run, where it’s impossible to scream. All he could do was watch as Anna looked at him like he was the messiah, like he was the answer to her prayers, like she wasn’t supposed to be the answer to his that had gone so, so wrong.

“You’ll be the most powerful vessel,” she whispered. “Even more powerful than an archangels’. The Righteous Man.”

She took one last step to him. Closing the distance.

“This is going to hurt,” she told him calmly, and then shoved the angel grace into his chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The 200th was so legit last night. I laughed, I cried, and I screamed because THAT ENDING.
> 
> This chapter was my favorite to write, seeing as I've been waiting to write it since the first chapter, so I hope you enjoyed it! One more to go!
> 
> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com
> 
> x Slang


	28. Lucifer Rising

Castiel is falling.

He is falling, and he is screaming, and he is burning.

He feels like a meteor hurtling past galaxies, or a star collapsing in on itself. He feels like a natural disaster, like a monsoon towering over a beach, like a volcano bubbling over the edge. He feels like the last hope that just slips away.

He feels like an angel, falling to earth.

It takes too long, what feels like centuries, for him to fall, tumbling through the air, every molecule in his body screaming, every piece of him feeling like it was being shattered and then fixed and then shattered again and again. He felt like, maybe, this wouldn’t work. That he would burn up into the atmosphere, a shooting star stopping short, dissolving into a scattering of constellations.

He wishes he would die when he crashes. He doesn’t.

~*~

Castiel stirred as he returned to himself, an involuntary groan ripping from his throat with the consistency of sand paper. Something just under his skin was burning—not uncomfortable, but not welcome, and yet it continued to burn deeper, to burn even more of his humanity away, stealing him away piece by piece. He felt a weight on his back, a new sense at the forefront of his mind, and he pushed it away, desperately reaching out with his hands and pulling himself up, climbing out of the crater in the earth that marked the place where he fell. He stumbled, uneven and scared, terrified, not bothering to pretend otherwise when he felt the shift of something foreign at his shoulder blades, helping keep him steady like a ship’s mast in a storm. Castiel stared down at his hands, at how they were shaking. He looked down at himself, hoping to find blood, hoping to find broken bones, but there was nothing, not even dirt staining his clothing. Castiel brought his hands up to touch his face, and was almost shocked to find them come away wet with tears.

Everything was different. Everything was wrong.

He felt it all. He felt the world with a new shift in dynamic, with a new sense of power. He had gone from one of the beings living on this rock hurtling through space into one of the creatures that could control it, and Castiel looked out around him, at a clearing in a forest, and it was so wrong, _so wrong_ , and he couldn’t think because this wasn’t right, he wasn’t right, he shouldn’t be able to see the histories of trees and the pulse of the underbrush and he shouldn’t know the heartbeat of every animal, the stroke of every bird’s wings. Castiel felt a familiar panic pressing into his chest, making it hard to breathe, but he knew that he didn’t have to breathe, could feel it in the almost mechanical feeling of pushing and pulling air into and out of his lungs, at the way his heart wasn’t really beating, and Castiel closed his eyes and counted to ten the way he had taught himself since he was a child hiding in closets from the monsters outside of it. And then, he opened him.

The crater beneath him, the place where he fell, was deep. And it was flanked by indents shaped like angel wings.

He felt lost. He felt impossible. But his brain was acting on instinct, as if Anna had turned on all the right switches and he was waking up, a computer rebooting, and he knew what he had to do. He felt the universe shifting under his feet, knew that he was going to be too late but the only real thought he had was _Dean_ over and over and over again until he heard himself screaming it, desperation ripping it raw and real from his lungs, and Castiel reached up and gripped his hair and felt the broken bones of his wings.

He knew he was going to be late. Knew it was too late. But he felt the pull, and he let his wings spread, and he barely had to think before he was landing unseen in the middle of a warzone, feeling like he was trapped inside of a nightmare.

But no. No, this was too real, because he knew he would never sleep again and he could feel the layer of reality beyond the layer he hid in now, invisible to the human eye, trapped and trapped and trapped again and he was standing in the middle of a church room in an old convent in Ilchester and he is watching the blood from Lilith’s body seeping into the floor, opening a cage that should never have been bothered, and Dean and Sam were standing there with Ruby dead at their feet, and—

And it was too late.

Then, Castiel felt it. In the peace of the natural order, he felt the tremor.

And then he felt the shift.

“I’m sorry,” Sam Winchester whispered brokenly to his betrayed brother in the last moment of silence.

The shift turned into an avalanche. Castiel, for a moment, moved as if to reach out and grab something to anchor himself to earth, but that was not where he belonged anymore, and he did not need to be held down. He watched, shaking harder than the world around him, as Dean reached out and grabbed onto the front of his little brother’s jacket, looking calm in the face of the end but at once so scared, his eyes betraying him again, and his voice reflected it when he urged hurriedly, “Sammy, let’s go.”

Sam reached out and grabbed onto the front of Dean’s shirt, looking so much like a lost and scared boy that Castiel could have been looking at them when they were children, when Dean was the only thing in between Sammy and the monsters, when Dean first started to believe that he was the only one that could save the world. Dean was the one who had protected his little brother, and Sam always turned to Dean as his anchor and his shield when he couldn’t handle the world anymore, when it became too much to bear, and Castiel could see Sam’s soul, could see that the piece of him that was nothing more than a terrified little kid was still there, and it was showing now. Sam’s knuckles were almost white in his grip. Dean was gripping even harder.

The jagged circle of blood was glowing now, and Castiel could hear the trapped angel below that yelling for his freedom, yelling for his vengeance. He felt the earth tremble at the presence of another scorned brother who had just believed in his cause much too much.

“Dean,” Sam said, white with horror, destroyed by his own good intentions, and Castiel would never forget the look in Sam’s eyes when he said, “He’s coming.”

Castiel closed his eyes, and he prayed.

He pushed it out into the world, using it the same way he thought the angels used magic, but this was it, it was just believing, willing, instead of wielding his angel powers like a blade, he just _wanted_ it—Sam to be cured, the brothers to be saved. Castiel willed it to happen, believed in it more than he had ever believed in himself, and then the brothers were gone from the room, and Castiel felt them in an airplane passing over the city, safe from the cage that was opening, the grace that was clawing its way out, and, for a moment, Castiel paused.

He looked at that grace, heard Lucifer screaming, felt his pain and anguish and the twist of sympathy from the grace inside of him that had been nothing more than an archangel’s prize, and then Castiel tore his eyes from the angel he could see inside of the grace and ripped himself away, his wings whisking him away from the building a nanosecond before it all went nuclear and Lucifer was free, and Castiel felt his knees hit the ground of the spot in which he fell to earth and felt the beginning of the end, Sam’s words on repeat in his mind, like the worst of all reminders, like the call to arms that it was, like the end:

_He’s coming._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AND THAT'S A WRAP! Thank you for everyone who's stuck with me this long! Your support means the world to me!
> 
> The prequel ficlet, In the Beginning, will be posted in five days. The sequel, Raised, will begin updating about ten days after that. :)
> 
> Thank you all so much for sticking with me through this wild ride. It means a lot.
> 
> x Slang
> 
> My Tumblr: shortenedlanguage.tumblr.com


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